Home improvement giant Home Depot (HD) cannot catch a break lately. Word recently emerged that a smoke detector theft ring in Florida that had been targeting the company was recently broken up, with seven arrests so far. Despite this, shareholders found cause to back out, as shares slipped over 1.5% in Wednesday afternoon’s trading.
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The smoke detector theft ring somehow managed to get around $800,000 worth of smoke detectors out of Home Depot stores located throughout Florida, reports noted. The ring was broken up as the result of an investigation that lasted months and featured elements of the Department of Agriculture and the Consumer Services Office of Agricultural Law Enforcement in Florida.
There were at least 44 smoke detector thefts that took place at Home Depot locations in 17 different counties throughout Florida. Some of the smoke detectors were actually recovered, reports noted, with about $78,000 worth found in a storage unit, and about $300,000 worth found in a warehouse in Houston, Texas. So about half of the missing product is accounted for already. The suspects involved, meanwhile, have been charged with an array of crimes, from organized retail theft to conspiracy to commit racketeering.
Skelly Upgrade
Meanwhile, Home Depot does not seem to be leaving well enough alone when it comes to its home decorations for Halloween. A new report suggests that the popular Skelly giant skeleton lawn ornament has been upgraded to include app control.
The reports noted that the Ultra Skelly is actually smaller than its standard version—just 6.5 feet tall—but comes with a moving mouth, 18 different eye expressions thanks to an LCD platform, and a rotating upper torso. Users can even record their own messages via the app and play them back over a Bluetooth connection, making sure that the trick-or-treaters that happen upon your house will be extra freaked out.
Is Home Depot a Good Long-Term Buy?
Turning to Wall Street, analysts have a Strong Buy consensus rating on HD stock based on 19 Buys and six Holds assigned in the past three months, as indicated by the graphic below. After a 1.48% loss in its share price over the past year, the average HD price target of $446.30 per share implies 11.87% upside potential.
