McDonald's - American fast food (BUY - 240)

McDonald's Corporation operates and franchises McDonald's restaurants in the United States and internationally. Its restaurants offer various food products, soft drinks, coffee, and other beverages, as well as breakfast menu. As of March 31, 2019, the company operated 37,971 restaurants, including 35,278 franchised restaurants. McDonald's Corporation was founded in 1940 and is based in Chicago, Illinois.

McDonalds's share price - EBITDA & EPS
Mcdonald's stock has shown consistent and reliable performance, which is set to continue as overseas markets are acting as catalysts for growth. Currently it is trading at a rather high evaluation with a P/E of 27x, which is not an unusual ratio compared to one of its competitors;

Chipotle Mexican Grill - P/E 92.5x.

Apart from a few U.S. based competitors, nothing is as big as McDonald's in terms of image and worldwide presence. Therefore, the company enjoys an almost monopolistic stance as it continues to serve people fast-food, and being at the epicentre of continued economic growth in emerging markets.

Consensus analyst EBITDA for the following years also present a strong case for continued growth;


I would therefore set a target price of 240$ until the end of Q1, 2020.

Profiting strategies on the future developments surrounding the stock are numerous;

1. Purchasing a deep-in-the-money call-options with a strike at 200$, (with an expiry 1-1.5 years in to the future*) would offer substantial leverage. Basically entering a synthetic-long-stock position. 

2. Purchasing the stocks themselves.

For those with a conservative risk-profile I would suggest purchasing at-the-money puts in order to hedge McDonald's stock against further market volatility;

Since the multiplier is 1 option=100 shares, 210 ATM puts would cost 10*100=1000 dollars for hedging 100*210=21 000$ worth of McDonald's stock.