Bullish option flow was detected in MA stock on December 28, 2021. On December 29, 2021, MA stock continued a bullish uptrend in pre-market trading.
MA Stock Bullish Option Flow
Make sure to review this lesson on option flow so that you understand the image above.
Mastercard SpendingPulse: U.S. Retail Sales Grew 8.5% This Holiday Season
On December 26, 2021, according to Mastercard SpendingPulseTM, holiday retail sales excluding automotive increased 8.5% year-over-year this holiday season, running from November 1 through December 24. Notably, online sales grew 11.0% compared to the same period last year, the preliminary insights show. Mastercard SpendingPulse measures in-store and online retail sales across all forms of payment.
“Shoppers were eager to secure their gifts ahead of the retail rush, with conversations surrounding supply chain and labor supply issues sending consumers online and to stores in droves,” said Steve Sadove, senior advisor for Mastercard and former CEO and Chairman of Saks Incorporated. “Consumers splurged throughout the season, with apparel and department stores experiencing strong growth as shoppers sought to put their best dressed foot forward.”
Findings from Mastercard SpendingPulse underscore the strength of the holiday shopper across channels, with consumers returning to stores (+8.1% YOY), and e-commerce continuing to expand, up 11.0% compared to 2020. Additional key findings include:
- Consumers shopped early: Continuing a key trend from 2020, U.S. consumers shopped earlier than in years past, as retailers offered special promotions early and then again later in the season as shoppers raced to secure “guaranteed by Christmas” shipping offers. Looking at Mastercard’s expanded holiday season, total retail sales were up +8.6%* YOY for the 75 days between October 11 and December 24.
- Thanksgiving weekend remained key: Black Friday marked the top spending day of the 2021 holiday season yet again. For the Thanksgiving weekend running Friday, November 26 through Sunday, November 28, shoppers drove U.S. retail sales up +14.1% YOY. In-store sales also rebounded, increasing +16.5% YOY while e-commerce sales experienced sustained growth, up +4.9% YOY.
- Smaller boxes had a big impact: Whether consumers were shopping for themselves or for loved ones, the Jewelry sector experienced some of the strongest YOY and YO2Y growth.
- E-commerce sales snowballed: This holiday season, e-commerce made up 20.9% of total retail sales, up from 20.6% in 2020 and 14.6% in 2019. The channel continues to experience elevated growth as consumers enjoy the ease of holiday browsing and buying in the comfort of their own homes.
Mastercard SpendingPulse reports on national retail sales across all payment types in select markets around the world. The findings are based on aggregate sales activity in the Mastercard payments network, coupled with survey-based estimates for certain other payment forms, such as cash and check.
Mastercard SpendingPulse defines “U.S. retail sales” as sales at retailers and food services merchants of all sizes. Sales activity within the services sector (for example, travel services such as airlines and lodging) are not included. Holiday spending insights are preliminary.
Mastercard is a global technology company in the payments industry. Our mission is to connect and power an inclusive, digital economy that benefits everyone, everywhere by making transactions safe, simple, smart and accessible. Using secure data and networks, partnerships and passion, our innovations and solutions help individuals, financial institutions, governments and businesses realize their greatest potential.
Mastercard to Add to Services Momentum with Acquisition of Dynamic Yield, McDonald’s Cutting-Edge Personalization Platform
On December 21, 2021, Mastercard (NYSE: MA) and McDonald’s (NYSE: MCD) announced an agreement for Mastercard to acquire McDonald’s state-of-the-art personalization platform and decision engine company, Dynamic Yield. Dynamic Yield’s technology is a natural addition to Mastercard’s existing suite of services that help brands deliver more effective and trusted customer experiences across channels.
Sitting across online and offline channels to personalize a consumer’s experience with a brand, Dynamic Yield delivers individualized product recommendations, offers and content based on a range of factors, including past purchases, page views, time of day, current store traffic and trending products. The software-as-a-service (SaaS) platform uses advanced AI and other technologies to support 400+ brands across the retail, financial services, travel and restaurant industries, among others.
”The notion of going into a store or opening a webpage to find an experience perfectly tailored to you is no longer farfetched. It’s a reality that more brands are deploying and more consumers expect. With Dynamic Yield’s expertise and our scale and relationships, we’ll be able to bring the connections between the end consumer and our customers to new heights,” said Raj Seshadri, President of Data & Services, Mastercard.
Mastercard plays a central role in enabling trusted digital commerce experiences, connecting billions of consumers with millions of merchants and banks around the world safely and securely. With Dynamic Yield’s technology, Mastercard will be able to help its customers and partners meet consumers’ growing demand for a more personalized experience, no matter where they shop or do business. The creation of a unified consumer engagement and loyalty hub will further extend the value of Mastercard’s network to deliver digital services for payments and beyond.
This builds on the company’s long track record of providing data-driven loyalty, analytics and marketing services, rooted in focused data responsibility principles. This includes the SessionM merchant loyalty platform and Test & Learn (APT) experimentation software.
McDonald’s purchased Dynamic Yield in 2019, becoming one of the first brands to integrate decision technology into its restaurants. Under McDonald’s ownership, Dynamic Yield doubled its revenueThe income statement provides a summary of a company's revenue and expenses over a specified period of time, typically a year or a quarter. It shows the company's total revenue, th... and expanded its customer base across verticals. To date, Dynamic Yield’s technology has been deployed to McDonald’s drive-thrus and ordering kiosks in several markets around the world.
The deployment and enhancement of this technology has been an important component of McDonald’s Accelerating the Arches growth strategy under which the brand has also prioritized improving ordering experiences, introduced a global loyalty program and expanded its delivery footprint. The acquisition by Mastercard will strengthen unique, existing synergies across McDonald’s digital engagement experiences currently powered by SessionM and Test & Learn. In addition, McDonald’s plans to further scale and integrate Dynamic Yield’s capabilities globally and across ordering channels.
“We’re delighted to continue working with McDonald’s, a longstanding client and proven innovator in this space,” Seshadri continued.
In addition to McDonald’s, a number of merchant and financial services brands already use both Dynamic Yield and existing Mastercard services. Synchrony has worked with both companies on digital customer engagement. “Synchrony works hard every day to deliver simple, tailored and relevant interactions to enhance the consumer experience,” said Jeff Brousseau, Senior Vice President, Performance Marketing, Synchrony. “With Dynamic Yield, we’ve been able to deliver contextual, personalized experiences across the consumer journey. Combining this with the power of Mastercard’s other digital services unlocks additional capabilities to further enrich consumer engagement.”
MasterCard price target lowered to $380 from $400 at Wedbush
On December 20, 2021, Wedbush analyst Moshe Katri lowered the firm’s price target on MasterCard to $380 from $400 and keeps an Outperform rating on the shares. The analyst cites continued indications of choppy consumer spending, renewed pandemic-driven B&M shutdowns/travel slowdown as well as likely reduced spending on non-discretionary items given inflationary pricing pressure on staple goods.
📽 Holiday sales jump to biggest gain in 17 years: Mastercard data
[embedyt] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AB0aVA-57×0[/embedyt]📈 MA Stock Technical Analysis
The long-term trend is still neutral, but the short-term trend is positive, so the stock is getting more and more appreciated by traders and investors. MA is part of the IT Services industry. There are 150 other stocks in this industry, MA did better than 60% of them. MA is currently trading in the middle of its 52-week range. The S&P500 Index however is currently trading near new highs, so MA is lagging the market. There is a resistance zone ranging from 361.37 to 365.09. This zone is formed by a combination of multiple trend lines in the daily time frame. There is support at 360.18 that is formed by a combination of multiple trend lines in multiple time frames. MA has an average technical rating and the quality of the presented setup is also not ideal at the moment. Price movement has been a little bit too volatile to find a nice entry and exit point. It is probably a good idea to wait for a consolidation first. Click here to sign up for email alerts on when MA stock consolidates and is a good long entry.
