Sustainable Impact Investing, or ESG investing, is gaining traction not only with Argus Research clients but also with the global investment community. BlackRock CEO Lawrence Fink, who oversees approximately $9 trillion in assets, announced in January 2020 that his firm would be investing in companies that are making progress on sustainability. He doubled down in his January 2021 letter, calling on company managements to disclose their plans for making their businesses "compatible with a net-zero economy" by 2050. As assets have flowed in over the past 40 years, Sustainable Impact Investing has evolved. The discipline, originally known as Socially Responsible Investing, focused at first on excluding companies that conducted business in South Africa, or participated in industries such as tobacco, alcohol, and firearms. Performance of these initial strategies lagged, and the approach has been modified. Now, instead of merely identifying industries to avoid, the discipline promotes "sustainable" business practices across all industries that can have an "impact" on global issues such as climate, hunger, poverty, disease, shelter, and workers' rights.

Deutsche Telekom merged its T-Mobile USA unit with prepaid specialist MetroPCS in 2013, and that firm merged with Sprint in 2020, creating the second-largest wireless carrier in the US T-Mobile now serves 77 million postpaid and 21 million prepaid phone customers, equal to around 30% of the US retail wireless market. The firm entered the fixed-wireless broadband market aggressively in 2021 and now serves more than 5 million residential and business customers. In addition, T-Mobile provides wholesale services to resellers.

Management's ability to "raise guidance" can often be a catalyst for market-beating returns in the quarters ahead. The first-quarter earnings season has crossed the 90% mark and is wrapping up, with blended earnings (actual results and the consensus for those still to report) showing a year-over-year gain of almost 7%, according to Refinitiv. That is considerably better than the 4%-7% advance expected at the start of the earnings period. Leading the outperformance were strong gains in Communication Services earnings, up 43%, and Consumer Discretionary, up 26%. On the flipside, Healthcare and Energy, both down 24%, are performing the worst. Our analysts are always on the lookout for companies that boost outlooks during earnings season, as this is often a signal for momentum in the months ahead. Here is an initial list of BUY-rated companies in the Argus Fundamental Universe of Coverage at which management raised guidance or increased its outlook during the 1Q24 EPS reporting season.

T-Mobile US is a facilities-based wireless telephone carrier. The company is the result of the merger of Deutsche Telekom's T-Mobile U.S. wireless division with small regional wireless carrier MetroPCS on April 30, 2013. T-Mobile acquired Sprint on April 1, 2020 and Ka'ena Corp. (Mint Mobile) on May 2024. The company offers national wireless voice and data services to consumers and businesses in the U.S, and simple no-contract service plans.