KKD where will it bounce today ?
Krispy Kreme shares sag after loss warning
June 14, 2005 13:49:39 (ET)
CHICAGO (MarketWatch) -- Krispy Kreme shares turned lower Tuesday, a day after the doughnut maker warned that its quarterly filing would be late and would show a loss as well.
Krispy Kreme (KKD, Trade) shares dropped nearly 5%, or 41 cents, to $8.15 in recent action. The Winston-Salem, N.C.-based chain's stock had been crawling higher in the last month from $6.30.
The troubled company said a 17 percent dive in sales to $153 million would lead to a loss for the fiscal first quarter. However, it will remain unclear exactly how deep the results fell into the abyss until the company completes its regulatory filings.
At this point, Krispy Kreme said it is still picking through accounting practices surrounding certain transactions and won't be able to file its quarterly report on time for the three months ended May 1. In fact, the company hasn't filed a report since September as it looks at restating results from 2004 and 2005.
The quarterly loss is a surprise to Wall Street, which had been expecting a profit of a penny a share, according to the average reached at Thomson First Call.
However, Krispy Kreme has seen sales and earnings plunge amid the double whammy of changing consumer eating habits and the high price tag to cover legal and regulatory issues related to probes of its accounting practices.
The SEC, for instance, is still investigating possible accounting irregularities related to the sale of certain franchise operations back to the company.
