Trade deal will spur FedEx

Article Excerpt

FEDEX CORP. $160 (New York symbol FDX; Aggressive Growth Portfolio, Consumer sector; Shares o/s: 264.4 million; Market cap: $42.3 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 0.6; Divid.end yield: 1.6%; TSINetwork Rating: Average; www.fedex.com) delivers packages and documents in the U.S. and 220 other countries. Revenue for the fiscal 2019 fourth quarter, ended May 31, 2019, rose 2.8%, to $17.8 billion from $17.3 billion a year earlier. That’s partly because it expanded ground delivery service in the U.S. to six-days-a-week from five to meet rising e-commerce volumes. However, the expanded schedule has added to FedEx’s costs: Earnings in the quarter fell 17.7%, to $1.32 billion from $1.60 billion. Due to fewer shares outstanding, earnings per share declined 15.2%, to $5.01 from $5.91. Those amounts exclude several unusual items, among them the costs to integrate European courier TNT Express. FedEx bought it for $4.9 billion in May 2016, and now expects to spend a total of $1.7 billion on TNT’s integration by the end of fiscal 2021. The stock is down…