Speed Bump for Avis Budget

Under normal circumstances, I would be very happy to have a 10% return in one of my stocks in just five weeks, but that is not the case with shares of Avis Budget Group (CAR). The sharp pullback last week came as quite a surprise to me. Shares had recently risen past the $15 mark, giving me a tidy 30% one-month gain. Presumably investors were increasingly coming to see the benefits that I saw in the recent acquisition of Avis Europe. I still think that's the case, despite a pullback to the $12.50 range.

The selloff is the result of a slightly weak quarter. Sales of $1.63 billion were just shy of the $1.65 billion forecast. Core earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization (EBITDA) of $64 million were especially weak, considering that analysts had been looking for $85 million. On the conference call, management suggested that investors may have been underestimating the fact that the December quarter is seasonally weak, especially in Europe....349 more words left in this article. To read them, just click below and try Real Money FREE for 14 days.

Read the full story and get access to the Real Money Pro trading floor.

There’s no substitute for a trading floor to get great ideas, so Jim Cramer created a better one at Real Money and blogs there exclusively. We then added legendary hedge fund manager, Doug Kass, with his exclusive Daily Diary and best investing ideas. Staffed with more than 4 dozen investing pros, money managers, journalists and analysts, Real Money Pro gives you a flood of opinions, analysis and actionable trading advice found nowhere else, and allows you to interact directly with each expert.

Already a Subscriber? Please login.

Except as otherwise indicated, quotes are delayed. Quotes delayed at least 20 minutes for all exchanges. Market Data provided by Interactive Data. Company fundamental data provided by Morningstar. Earnings and ratings provided by Zacks. Mutual fund data provided by Valueline. ETF data provided by Lipper. Powered and implemented by Interactive Data Managed Solutions.

TheStreet Ratings updates stock ratings daily. However, if no rating change occurs, the data on this page does not update. The data does update after 90 days if no rating change occurs within that time period.

IDC calculates the Market Cap for the basic symbol to include common shares only. Year-to-date mutual fund returns are calculated on a monthly basis by Value Line and posted mid-month.