5 Best Household and Personal Care Stocks To Buy

3. Bath & Body Works, Inc. (NYSE:BBWI)

Number of Hedge Fund Holders: 46

Bath & Body Works, Inc. (NYSE:BBWI) operates a specialty retailer of home fragrance, body care, soaps, and sanitizer products. It is one of the top household stocks to invest in. On February 23, Bath & Body Works, Inc. (NYSE:BBWI) reported a Q4 non-GAAP EPS of $1.86 and a revenue of $2.89 billion, topping Wall Street estimates by $0.24 and $80 million, respectively. 

On May 2, Adrienne Yih, an analyst at Barclays, decreased the price target for Bath & Body Works, Inc. (NYSE:BBWI) from $44 to $37 and maintained an Equal Weight rating on the shares. According to the firm’s promotional tracker, promos in Q1 are similar to those in Q4, indicating that consumers in all income brackets are reducing their discretionary spending on products. The analyst noted an increasing risk to the hopes for a demand recovery in the second half of the year.

According to Insider Monkey’s fourth quarter database, 46 hedge funds were long Bath & Body Works, Inc. (NYSE:BBWI), compared to 51 funds in the prior quarter. 

Third Point made the following comment about Bath & Body Works, Inc. (NYSE:BBWI) in its Q4 2022 investor letter:

“We initiated a position in Bath & Body Works, Inc. (NYSE:BBWI) earlier in the year that we added to significantly in the Fourth Quarter. The company, which sells personal care and home fragrance products, separated from Victoria’s Secret in late 2021 and has struggled to find its footing in the public markets. Bath & Body Works was challenged by the normalization of trends following the pandemic, but also suffered from execution hiccups that made matters worse. On the operations front, the company spent much of 2022 without a permanent CEO, cut guidance multiple times given inventory and cost pressures, and did a poor job communicating meaningful increases in the company’s cost structure as a standalone business. On the capital allocation front, the execution of an accelerated share repurchase program was sloppy at best.

Despite these recent struggles, we believe BBWI can change its equity story, improve its earnings power, and earn a more premium valuation. The recent appointment of a new CEO, Gina Boswell from Unilever, is an encouraging first step…” (Click here to read the full text)