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Weight Watchers Surges on Better Results After Diet-Season Rout
Weight Watchers Breaks From Diet-Season Rout With Better Results
03 May 2019, 09:15 PM IST
(Bloomberg) -- Weight Watchers International Inc. rose the most in 15 months after its better-than-expected first-quarter results eased investor concerns after a tough start to the year. “We feel we identified what the issues are and made changes,” Chief Executive Officer Mindy Grossman said in an interview. “We certainly stabilized the business.”
(Bloomberg) -- Weight Watchers International Inc. rose the most in 15 months after its better-than-expected first-quarter results eased investor concerns after a tough start to the year. “We feel we identified what the issues are and made changes,” Chief Executive Officer Mindy Grossman said in an interview. “We certainly stabilized the business.”
- The wellness company forecast earnings per share this year between $1.35 and $1.55 a share, beating the average analyst estimate.
Key Insights
- The company that’s rebranded as WW gave Wall Street encouraging signs on Thursday, a welcome reversal after its previous quarter’s results sent shares plummeting on fears that a slow start to the year -- traditionally diet season -- would be hard to recover from. Subscribers grew 0.9 percent year on year in the latest quarter, with management targeting “recruitment and retention” as two key 2019 goals.
- Weight Watchers decided after the rough fourth quarter to bring shareholder Oprah Winfrey back front and center in its marketing. It launched a new spot this week featuring the celebrity, one of the largest shareholders. Grossman said the new adds are working.
- More than half the company’s subscribers are now on the digital platform only, instead of attending the community -- or studio -- meetings the company originally built its brand on.
Market Reaction
- The stock jumped as much as 18 percent to $23.90 Friday in New York, the most intraday since February 2018. And while that has helped pare losses so far this year, the shares are still down about 39 percent.
- Get more on the numbers here.
To contact the reporter on this story: Craig Giammona in New York at cgiammona@bloomberg.net
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Anne Riley Moffat at ariley17@bloomberg.net, Lisa Wolfson
©2019 Bloomberg L.P.
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