Shoppers At Niketown Store In San Francisco.
David Paul Morris | Bloomberg | Getty Images
Nike‘s stock is on pace to open at an all-time high on Wednesday morning after hitting one in extended trading on Tuesday, on the heels of the company’s better-than-expected earnings report.
Shares were last up nearly 6%, trading around $92.15. The stock had last hit an intraday high of $90 on April 18. It closed Tuesday at $87.18.
Investors are rallying behind Nike’s continued sales growth, as investments in designing new high-tech sneakers and fashion-forward apparel, expanding its fleet of Nike stores and selling less products in discount outlets are clearly paying off.
During a call with analysts Tuesday evening, CEO Mark Parker said “the global shift towards more active lifestyles continues to accelerate, and demand for athletic product is high.” He added: “the opportunities ahead are as bright as I’ve ever seen them.” Parker also said women’s will continue to be a “high priority” for Nike, as the category grew at a double-digit rate in the latest quarter.
As of Wednesday morning, a handful of analysts had already upgraded their price targets on Nike shares.
Cowen & Co. raised its price target to $103 from $100, which it says indicates “the durability of Nike’s global growth potential.”
“Management’s confidence seems as high as we can remember as investments continue to generate record high returns on capital,” the firm said in a note to clients.
Jefferies raised its price target to $97 from $80, saying in a note to clients that the company’s earnings “crushed it” this quarter. “Nike’s business is strengthening in [North America], and we expect the company to continue to recapture the share it has lost to Adidas,” Jefferies said.
Wall Street is also noticing Nike’s recent slew of acquisitions of tech start-ups, signaling Nike has been thinking outside of the box and ahead of many of its peers. In August, CNBC reported that Nike acquired predictive analytics company Celect for an undisclosed amount to be able to better predict what styles of sneakers and apparel customers want, when they want it and where they want to buy it from.
That came after it already acquired consumer data analytics firm Zodiac, in a bid to speed its “digital transformation,” and a computer vision company Invertex.
“The digital capabilities that we’re creating and investing in are really going to make us a better innovation company — understanding the consumer, serving the consumer, leveraging the innovation that we invest in,” Parker said on Tuesday. “It’s all making us better.”
Nike shares have climbed more than 17% this year, and the company has a market cap of roughly $136.6 billion.