Consumer – Beverages: First

John Faucher logs his fourth consecutive first-place finish; the J.P. Morgan researcher also captures a ­runner-up position in Cosmetics, Household & Personal Care Products. “He combines an understanding of company fundamentals and strategy with a great feel for how the industry group trades,” extols one satisfied client. For the past year Faucher, 43, has held a decidedly bearish view, for myriad reasons: Europe’s sovereign-­debt crisis and its impact on consumer spending, rising prices of raw materials, and outsize expectations with regard to corporate earnings, as well as other factors. In early October 2011 he urged buy-­siders to underweight the sector relative to the broad market, and it proved to be good advice. By the end of August, beverage companies had risen 19.4 percent but trailed the Standard & Poor’s 500 index by 8.6 percentage points. Faucher “is numbers oriented,” notes one money manager. “Amazingly, many sell-side analysts aren’t.” Adds another: “John does a nice job of parsing out investor expectations and the underlying fundamentals.” Looking ahead, “I’m optimistic that the beverage category will get more rational,” Faucher says, with prices stabilizing and sales of noncarbonated drinks rising.