By coinnews 
00:00 Seana Smith
certainly tariffs have not been reflected when it comes to apparel and footwear within today’s CPI prints. That’s largely because we already had the inventory in store, both apparel and footwear. They saw their biggest declines since, well, only January, since three months ago. And both are highly volatile, but if you take a closer look, and you look at apparel, they declined 0.2%, and actually in March, it saw an increase. And what I’m hearing from experts over the course of today is that that increase back in March was likely caused by that pull forward that we saw ahead of those tariffs going into effect. And that’s also seen within footwear. We saw a decline in prices for the month of April, down 0.5%. In March, we saw less of a decline, of 0.1%. Now, KPMG US sector leader told me, quote, “We’re selling inventory that’s already in stock with prices that were pre-tariffs. As we look further into the summer, and maybe mostly fall, you’re going to start to see the impact of tariffs on those products that are going to come in later.” Now, another expert telling me that we could expect to see some peak, strong prints during the summer. Core goods, that’s including vehicles, could increase between 5/10 and even a percent increase. And that’s largely because we’ve been talking about this for months. It’s this flow through. It’s it’s first the fruits and vegetables, then it’s the apparel, then, you know, electronics, and other, you know, bigger, bigger, uh, areas as well. And so apparel getting hit a bit later, not reflected today.
02:26 Brian Sozzi
So against this backdrop, against this environment, what are analysts saying their top picks are? What are they telling clients?
02:36 Seana Smith
Yeah, right now, top picks include companies like Crocs, even Abercrombie and Fitch. Others say that Nike is a strong buy here. And the reason why is, get this, one analyst saying Crocs, actually, they do have a lot of exposure to China, but they told me that because of the fact that they’re just a rubber molded shoe, and they don’t have the complexities of a sneaker, that they could actually benefit in this sort of environment, this high tariff environment. Abercrombie and Fitch and Nike have moved a lot of their exposure out of China, so that could bode well for them. In addition to that, uh, Nike is is still the biggest sneaker company in the world. And so many experts, I mean, many analysts on the street, telling me what Nike does, others will follow. And so that could be a good buying opportunity right now, as well.