02-22-2019: Clothing Retailers, Especially Teen Fashions, Face Challenging Times |
There are a large number of clothing and fashion retailers out
there, particularly in the discount department store arena.
Abercrombie & Fitch Co. (ANF) is one of them specializing in
teen and kids fashions, not exactly one of the most promising
booming areas of late. From the giants like Sears and Penney's,
down to the smaller retailers using Amazon.Com, many appear to be
struggling of late with balance sheets and earnings.
Competition from the Internet is a big factor affecting
companies like ANF that have a lot of retail stores.
Still, clothing companies have been struggling before, and find ways to shift marketing, adopt partnerships and distribution channels, or whatever it takes to survive. For many, their sheer size gives them a margin of safety and breathing room to come up with new strategies. And that is what ANF is attempting to do. Meanwhile, its stock has languished a bit attracting now some big buyers betting upon its ability to redirect efforts back to profitability.
One big gray area affecting all of them is uncertainty about trade relations with China. Almost all clothing retail managers are begging Trump not to carry on a trade war with China, as their bottom line will definitely be hurt.
Our recent article on Abercrombie & Fitch Company (ANF) is in the Archives Section Below.
Zenith's Active List of 39 Stocks as of 02/16/2019
(Updated once a week, usually on Saturday except when less than 5 trading days in the week.)Note: Zenith tries to pick only stocks which are shortable, but sometimes stocks appear afterward on the SEC Regulation SHO list of stocks which are not shortable, which is beyond our control. On some stocks, Zenith may hold more than the number of shares it trades in its inventory. Thus the "short" sale of such a security would technically not be a "short" sale for us and not subject to SEC rules regarding selling securities which are not deliverable. Also, stocks pop on and off the list available for shorting on successive days, so the presence of a stock on the current SHO list doesn't mean it was there at the time it was shorted.
Stocks recently restricted by SEC Rule 201 as not shortable unless we already have a position which are on our Active List include: IIN (12/01)
