4 Consumer Stock Stories for Investors to Follow

Starbucks Corporation (NASDAQ:SBUX): Current price $54.34

Starbucks intends to more than double to 40,000 its employees in Asia Pacific during the next five years, implying quite strongly that the chain expects coffee consumption to step up even during the slowing of major economies in the region. Last year, consumers spent $9.3 billion at coffee shops in the Asia Pacific region, a 66 percent increase from five years before, says the data provider Euromonitor International. Starbucks is number one there with over a quarter of the market share by coffee sales. Asia Pacific President Jinlong Wang commented that the region “has been a growth engine and will continue to be a growth engine despite economic uncertainty,” citing rapid growth in employees and stores.

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