Pilgrim's Pride Corporation (PPC)
NEUTRALFundamental
67
Price
$31.79
Market Cap
$7.68B
Part 1 · What the company is worth
Overview
Pilgrim's Pride raises, processes and sells chicken, and to a lesser extent pork, to grocery chains, foodservice operators and restaurants across the US, the UK, continental Europe and Mexico. It contracts with independent farmers who raise its birds under company supervision, then owns and runs the hatcheries, feed mills and processing plants that turn live birds into fresh, frozen and prepared chicken products, sold partly under its own brands and largely under retailers' private labels. JBS, the Brazilian meat producer, owns a large majority of its shares.
How it makes money
Revenue comes from selling processed chicken and pork by the pound to large retail and foodservice customers under contracts that are periodically renegotiated. Profitability is squeezed between two volatile costs it does not control: feed (corn and soybean meal), its largest expense, and wholesale chicken prices, which move with industry-wide supply and consumer demand. Because margins are thin and highly sensitive to this spread, results swing significantly from year to year even when sales volumes stay roughly stable.
Revenue by segment
Chicken and prepared-food products sold across the US to retail, foodservice and club-store customers; the largest and most mature market.
Fresh and prepared chicken sold in the UK and continental Europe under company and retailer private-label brands, run mainly through the Moy Park and Pilgrim's UK operations.
Chicken production and sales in Mexico, the smallest of the three regional segments.
Competitive moat
No identified moat · NoneChicken is a commodity: consumers and foodservice buyers choose largely on price, and Pilgrim's Pride's scale as one of the largest US processors lowers costs somewhat but does not let it charge more than smaller rivals for the same cut of meat. Feed costs and wholesale chicken prices are set by industry-wide supply and demand that no single producer, however large, can control.
What drives demand
DefensiveChicken is the most affordable major protein, so consumer demand for it stays fairly steady through economic cycles and can even rise when shoppers trade down from beef or dining out. What swings sharply is not demand but the margin between wholesale chicken prices and feed costs, which behaves more like a commodity spread than a typical demand cycle.
Key risks
- Feed cost volatility — Corn and soybean meal are Pilgrim's Pride's largest input costs, and a spike in grain prices, driven by weather, biofuel demand or trade disruptions, directly squeezes margins that the company cannot always pass through to customers.
- Wholesale chicken price cyclicality — Chicken prices swing with industry-wide production levels; when processors collectively grow supply too fast, prices and margins fall across the whole sector regardless of how efficiently any single company operates.
- Animal health and biosecurity risk — An outbreak of avian influenza or another disease can force the destruction of flocks, disrupt supply and trigger export restrictions from importing countries, hitting volume and costs at the same time.
- Litigation and regulatory exposure — Pilgrim's Pride has faced antitrust investigations and litigation over alleged price-fixing in the broiler-chicken industry, and adverse outcomes or new regulation could bring fines or changes to how the company can operate.
Customer concentration
Top customers account for 16.8% of revenue
The two largest US customers together account for about 17% of consolidated net sales, with no single customer above 10%, among a base that includes Chick-fil-A, Kroger, Costco, Walmart and McDonald's across its markets.
The case for
Buyers argue that geographic diversification across the US, UK, Europe and Mexico smooths out regional supply swings, that a shift toward more prepared and branded products reduces exposure to raw commodity pricing, and that scale as one of the world's largest chicken producers supports cost efficiency through the cycle.
The case against
Sellers fear that chicken remains a low-margin commodity business whose profits are set by the gap between feed costs and wholesale prices that no producer controls, that past antitrust litigation signals structural pricing risk across the industry, and that majority ownership by JBS limits minority shareholders' influence over capital allocation.
Written by the editors, published on August 18, 2026
Direct competitors
Who this company fights with for the same customers
No editorial profile for this company yet
No competitor list for this company yet.
Balance Sheet & Liquidity
Revenue
$18.44B
Trailing 12 months (through 6/28/2026)
Net Income
$546M
Trailing 12 months (through 6/28/2026)
Free Cash Flow
$1.12B
Total Equity
$3.68B
Total Liabilities
$6.65B
Current Ratio
1.36
Interest Coverage
5.61
Debt/EBITDA
1.50
Earnings Per Share
Revenue & Net Income
Free Cash Flow
Income Breakdown
Historical statement
Margins over time
Debt over time
How heavy the debt is
Growth grid
Growth — Revenue
Fair Value Estimation
Fair Value
$93.64
Current Price
$31.79
Margin of Safety
+66.1%
Fair Value Range
$60.87 - $126.42
Estimation Methods
Valuation Metrics
P/E Ratio
13.82
ROE
29.4%
P/B Ratio
2.02
P/FCF
10.36
Gross Margin
9.6%
ROIC
10.0%
Profitability Radar
Value Creation (Economic Moat)
ROIC
10.0%
WACC
6.7%
ROIC − WACC
+3.3 pp
ROIC exceeds the cost of capital — the company is creating value for shareholders.
Fundamental Analysis Criteria
Passed (18)
- EPS shows upward trend
- Price CAGR 5.44%
- ROIC 10.0%
- P/FCF 10.36
- P/B Ratio 2.02
- Debt/Equity ratio
- Operating Margin 5.0%
- Positive Free Cash Flow
- Current Ratio
- Interest Coverage
- Debt/EBITDA
- Return on Tangible Assets
- ROE 14.8%
- Revenue Growth 5Y 8.9%
- PEG Ratio 0.18
- Earnings Quality (OCF/NI) 2.24
- Share Dilution 0.3%
- Piotroski F-Score 6/9
Failed (8)
- Gross Margin 9.6%
- CapEx intensity
- Low reliance on intangibles
- Price below Graham Number
- DCF valuation (Fairly valued)
- Analyst Consensus 36% Buy
- Earnings Surprise avg -9.9%
- Net Margin Trend 3.0% vs 6.8%
Unavailable (1)
- Dividend Payout NaN%
Piotroski F-Score
Mixed signals: some areas need attention
Earnings Quality
High quality: earnings backed by cash
Share Dilution
Share count is stable
Governance
Executive Team
| Name | Title | Age |
|---|---|---|
| Mr. Fabio Sandri | President & CEO | 53 |
| Mr. Matthew R. Galvanoni | CFO & Chief Accounting Officer | 52 |
| Mr. Andrew Rojeski | Head of Strategy, Investor Relations & Net-Zero Programs | - |
| Ms. Lisa Burdick | Head of Human Resources | - |
| Ms. Kendra Waldbusser | Head of Global Food Safety & Quality Assurance | - |
| Mr. Jesus Munoz | President of Pilgrim's Mexico | - |
Audit Risk
7
Board Risk
10
Compensation Risk
3
Shareholder Rights Risk
5
Part 2 · The price and when to enter
This part won't tell you whether the company is worth owning: it helps you choose when to buy it, once the fundamentals have convinced you. Inside: technical analysis, potential, historical drawdowns, gamma exposure.
Latest News
Recent headlines for PPC, sourced from Markets Gazette.
- 7d agoPOSITIVEJBS Seeks Rest of Pilgrim’s Pride Stake in $1.2 Billion Deal
Pilgrim's Pride Corp. shares surged following an offer from JBS NV to acquire the remaining stake in the chicken producer for approximately $1.2 billion. This all-stock deal values the company at $1.2 billion. JBS, already a major shareholder, aims to consolidate its ownership. For investors in Pilgrim's Pride, this represents a significant premium on their current holdings, potentially offering a lucrative exit or a continued stake in a larger, integrated entity under JBS's control.
via Markets Gazette