International Revenues and the Dollar

Stocks with a large percentage of international revenues benefited significantly from the Dollar's declines over the past few years.  Because the Dollar was cheap, foreign companies and governments bought more goods from the US.  If the Dollar continues to rally, however, this trade will reverse, and companies that generate more sales domestically will benefit. 

We've posted on the international revenues topic numerous times, and we even have a database that breaks out international and domestic revenues for all stocks in the Russell 1,000.  From the database, we calculated the average percentage of international revenues for stocks in each sector.  As shown, Technology has the highest at just over 50%, followed by Materials, Industrials, Consumer Staples and Energy.  Financials, Utilities and Telecom have the lowest foreign revenue exposure.  If the Dollar continues to rally, sectors with low foreign revenues could outperform, although it will be more pronounced on a stock by stock basis. 

Comments

[Urbane Gori...:]

Lets see.... Clothes and imported goods become more expensive at Costco, but Utilities become cheaper for Americans? That's because energy costs are cheaper? But utilities probably won't benefit because Americans will be using less energy as businesses fold, so that's kind of a wash.

Then, American products should benefit, because commodities are cheaper, but we may not be selling any more because foreign countries have less to spend because they are not selling to us and they are better at saving when they have to than we are. Seems a wash as well...

My head hurts! jegan ;-)

2008 Aug 09 02:18 PM