Defensive Stocks: Campbell’s & McDonald’s
August 5, 2009 by Tisa Silver
Filed under Finance
Today, I’ll continue my coverage of defensive stocks with Campbell Soup and McDonald’s.
Food manufacturers and fast food restaurants typically see increased sales during recessions. Consumers often shy away from dine-in restaurants and turn to fast food or home-cooked meals in order to cut costs. Let’s see if these two stocks have had a recession bounce.
Photo by George Donnelly, courtesy of flickr
Campbell Soup Company (Ticker: CBP) was founded in 1869 and is headquartered in Camden, New Jersey. Campbell’s brands include Pepperidge Farm, V8, Swanson and Prego. In its last fiscal year, Campbell brought in $7.998 billion in sales.
In the past two years, the stock is down about 17 percent. While CBP is in the negative for the 2-year holding period, it still outperformed the Dow and the S&P 500, both of which lost about 30 percent each for the same period. Campbell Soup is a part of the S&P 500. (View the 2-year chart of CPB vs. the Dow and the S&P 500)
McDonald’s (Ticker: MCD) – This worldwide fast food heavyweight needs no introduction. The stock is included in the Dow and the S&P 500, and has outperformed them both by a huge margin. MCD has packed on 16 percent versus a 30 percent loss for the Dow and the S&P 500 for the same period. (View the 2-year chart of MCD vs. the Dow and the S&P 500)
I chose these stocks randomly, but for the third day in a row, we have one winner and one loser. And again both stocks managed to beat the major indices.
Tomorrow, I’ll review The Coca-Cola Company and Procter & Gamble.
