Firearms-free Dick's still has plenty of sales ammunition

Normally if you pull products off the shelves that are core to a large chunk of your customers’ identity, you’d probably be shooting yourself in the foot. But good ole’ Dick’s Sporting Goods (DKS) took that risk and has spectacularly triumphed. Its call to ditch automatic rifles and high capacity magazines in the wake of the US mass shootings crisis could have truly hurt its bottom line, but instead, its share price jumped 17% with their latest earnings results.

Making a values call can be tricky, especially with political divisions running deep in the US and people only too willing to pick sides and express their outrage on social media. Another retailer to take a chance and win out was Nike (NKE), which picked up an Emmy this year for its Colin Kaepernick ad that sparked heavy controversy when it was released. Even Trump got in the act, tweeting that Nike’s shares were taking a hammering. But that hammering didn’t last, with online sales surging in response and its share price marching steadily north ever since.

Of course, it can be tough to know what noise is real and what is just, well, noise. Peloton (PTON) is probably trying to work that out right now after twitter took umbrage against one of its holiday ads showing a young lady working to keep the weight off on an exercycle her fella had given her. Its stock was travelling perfectly fine at the height of outrage, before dipping sharply. Coincidence or cause?

Democrats line up the telco market

Did you know nearly 60 million Americans don’t have broadband at home? Yeah, neither. Even worse, there are a couple of million still on dial-up. Throw that in your crazy US fact of the day for your workmates. It’s a fact that is generating plenty of chat in the political sphere this past week, as the leading Democrat contenders all now have fairly fleshed out telco policies that range from the bland to full-scale destruction.

AT&T (T), Verizon (VZ) and Comcast (CMCSA) will be hoping the millennials’ favourite Grandpa Bernie Sanders doesn’t get the opportunity to enact his plans for this sector, which includes unwinding past mega-mergers (think T-Mobile and Sprint, AT&T and Time Warner, Comcast and NBC) as well as regulating broadband pricing. The core of Sanders’ argument is that the big telcos are acting like monopolies and can’t be relied on to deliver services like universal broadband at a reasonable price, so the Government must intervene.

In that regard, he isn’t alone, as his fellow democratic contenders also believe it’s going to take a Government funding boost to get broadband out to all Americans. Biden, Warren and Mayor Pete have all earmarked tens of billions in cash for such an exercise, and there is no denying the economic benefits such investment can have. But one of them has to win first, otherwise, it may be a while yet before many Americans can download this post.

How healthy is that vegan looking?

In short, there are no signs of iron deficiency. In case you missed it, back in September Beyond Investing launched the Vegan Climate ETF* on the New York Stock Exchange, trading under the ticker VEGN, obviously. To be clear, this is not a fund that tracks listed companies that make vegan food. Because there basically aren’t any of them, other than Beyond Meat (BYND). 

What it is, is a vehicle for investors who want to be assured they are putting money into companies that line up with their values. Specifically, the Vegan ETF screens out any firm involved in animal testing or animal-derived products, as well those tied to fossil fuels, defence hardware (or software) or companies that could be linked to human rights abuses. 

The fund is currently weighted with tech companies like Microsoft (MSFT), Apple (AAPL) and Facebook (FB), but has been open about the fact it will jump on any new ethical businesses that move to a public listing (we’re looking at you Impossible Foods). Upon listing, the fund attracted an immediate $4 million and has been performing reasonably well, embarking on a slow but steady climb from an October low of $24 up to $26.50 this month. Its investors will be happy to see it continue to nibble away.

*Sadly, the Vegan Climate ETF isn’t on Hatch just yet.