Willis Group Shares Plunged: What You Need to Know (WSH)

Willis Group Shares Plunged: What You Need to Know

Watch stocks you care about

The single, easiest way to keep track of all the stocks that matter...

Your own personalized stock watchlist!

It's a 100% FREE Motley Fool service...

Click Here Now

Although we don't believe in timing the market or panicking over market movements, we do like to keep an eye on big changes -- just in case they're material to our investing thesis.

What: Insurer Willis Group Holdings (NYSE: WSH ) needs to put in a claim for losses today as high as 13%. The stock finally settled in at a mere 9% decline after the company reported third-quarter earnings this morning.

So what: Revenue for the quarter was $762 million and resulted in earnings per share of $0.41. It was a miss and a beat, as the Street was looking for $764.2 million in sales and $0.37 per share in earnings.

Now what: The company's forward-looking guidance is what's spooking investors, though, as the company sees full-year earnings per share in the range of $2.70 to $2.80 while analysts' consensus calls for $2.87. Despite the soft guidance, Barclays went ahead and upgraded the stock from equal weight to overweight while boosting its price target from $39 to $48. Barclays noted that property and casualty prices should improve, and the company sports a more attractive valuation than its peers.

Interested in more info on Willis Group? Add it to your watchlist.

The Steve Jobs Betrayal
You may already know that in the final year of his life, Jobs revealed a stunning betrayal — and told his biographer, "I will spend my last dying breath... and every penny of Apple's $40 billion in the bank to right this wrong." What was it that made Jobs so irate — and why could it make a few in-the-know investors some major profits over the coming months and years?

Enter your email address below to find out what made Jobs so enraged!

Fool contributor Evan Niu holds no position in any company mentioned. Check out his holdings and a short bio. Try any of our Foolish newsletter services free for 30 days. We Fools don't all hold the same opinions, but we all believe that considering a diverse range of insights makes us better investors. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.

Comments from our Foolish Readers

Help us keep this a respectfully Foolish area! This is a place for our readers to discuss, debate, and learn more about the Foolish investing topic you read about above. Help us keep it clean and safe. If you believe a comment is abusive or otherwise violates our Fool's Rules, please report it via the Report this Comment icon found on every comment.