Target is probably still missing the mark: Opening Bid top takeaway

Mon, Aug 18, 2025, 10:07 AM 3 min read

There will be no shortage of market-moving events this week.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky will be back in Washington after President Trump met with Vladimir Putin last week. Other European leaders will also be at the White House, namely French President Emmanuel Macron and Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni.

And this meeting coincides with the start of the Fed's Jackson Hole event.

Fed officials will do some fly-fishing at a stuffy old lodge in Wyoming. The bulls hope they catch a fat signal on a September rate cut as stocks trade around record highs.

The centerpiece of the Jackson Hole meeting will be Jerome Powell's speech on Friday. The Fed chair has used his speech as a clue dropper on rates in the past.

Last year, he signaled a rate cut was likely coming soon. The Fed went on to cut rates at its September and December meetings. But it's still a confusing event for traders to gauge.

"Powell could pave the road for a 25 basis point cut in September, he could push back on those expectations or he could simply not discuss policy much at all. From a market standpoint, any hint of promise of a rate cut will be welcomed, and push back on rate-cut expectations will likely cause a market decline," Sevens Report Research founder Tom Essaye said.

Chipotle (CMG) has only known high growth over the past decade.

High growth in terms of store openings, sales, and earnings. That's in large part because of the company's generous portion sizes and messaging of healthy ingredients.

Its shares are up 264% in the past 10 years, according to Yahoo Finance data, compared to the S&P 500's (^GSPC) 212% advance and McDonald's (MCD) 224% gain.

But now, Chipotle is heading into an interesting five-year period.

The company is adding new restaurant technology to drive efficiency. It's expanding into new countries such as Mexico. And it's picking up the pace of new menu offerings.

All of this comes as new fast-casual restaurant concepts sprout in Chipotle's backyard. Plus, consumers continue to be cautious about dining out as menu prices rise.

"The brands that are winning in this very tough consumer backdrop are the brands that are innovating in a really meaningful way. Innovation at Chipotle has always been very measured, and it will remain a measured process," Chipotle CEO Scott Boatwright told me in a new episode of the Opening Bid Unfiltered podcast. "I think we need to move up the speed of innovation."

The stock has dropped 27% in 2025 as the company clocked two quarterly traffic declines in a row.