Nike gets hit with yet another bearish Wall Street hot take

The L's keep piling up on the field for Nike ( NKE ) investors.

Stifel analyst Peter McGoldrick slashed his earnings-per-share estimates on Nike today by a whopping $0.20 for fiscal years 2027 and 2028. He cited near-term risk from increased promotional activity on Nike products in the US.

"Our hang-up on risk-reward remains on insufficient consumer demand for new products, while the Hoops Classics (18% of revenue) continues to shrink," McGoldrick said. "A new CFO and the November 16-17th Investor Day give management no incentive to raise expectations near-term. At 17x [2027 calendar year price-to-earnings estimates] versus a footwear median of 11x, we see risk to the multiple if there's another delay to the turnaround timeline."

It has been another rough year for Nike, as McGoldrick laid out. The stock is down 44% year to date and 51% over the past year.

Soccer icon Kylian Mbappé ended his long-term business tie-up with Nike last week and announced he will now be joining Swiss sports giant On ( ONON ). The company's stock will be kicked out of the S&P 100 ( ^SP100 ) today, ending an 18-year term on the index.

In late August, Dick's Sporting Goods ( DKS ) offered up a brutal warning about its business, in part because Nike is heavily discounting slow-moving product.

And let's not forget that in late June, Nike reported fiscal fourth quarter revenue of $11 billion, reflecting a 1% decline on a reported basis and a 4% drop on a currency-neutral basis.

While the company's diluted earnings per share of $0.72 appeared significantly stronger year over year, it was heavily distorted by a massive $0.52 per share one-time benefit from an expected tariff recovery.

The company continues to struggle with execution issues under CEO Elliott Hill, who boomeranged back to Nike in October 2024 and recently replaced the company's CFO. Changing sneaker preferences, cautious consumers, and hungry competitors like On continue to hold the company back, delaying any signs of a turnaround.

Nike projected fiscal first quarter revenues to be down by low-to-mid-single-digit percentages. It reiterated flat earnings per share growth over the next three quarters, excluding benefits from tariff recovery proceeds.

"No hints yet that revenues can turn positive in the foreseeable future — we don't see a clear reason to expand the P/E [ratio] from here (from 22x FY27 consensus EPS)," Evercore ISI analyst Michael Binetti wrote in a note.

Brian Sozzi is Yahoo Finance's Executive Editor, host of the Power Players with Brian Sozzi podcast, and a member of Yahoo Finance's editorial leadership team. Follow Sozzi on X @BrianSozzi , Instagram , and LinkedIn . Tips on stories? Email brian.sozzi@yahoofinance.com.