Target Corp. (Tii:TGT), led by UCLA graduate Brian Cornell, soundly defeated Ford Motor Co. (Tii:F), led by CEO James Farley, a Georgetown alum, to win TiiCKER’s inaugural Sweet 16 CEOs Competition and Sweepstakes. Over the last two weeks, the tournament has pit execs – representing both their alma maters and the publicly traded companies they lead – against each other while offering chances to win valuable prizes. In the title game, we looked at five-year stock returns to determine the victor. Target’s 124.6% return was more than enough to beat out Ford’s five-year return of -2.0%.
The competition started out with 16 “teams,” each representing a publicly-traded company, its CEO and the university they attended. The TiiCKER team measured stock returns over one, two, three, and five-year periods to determine winners.
In the Western Division, we had:
Baylor: M. Jay Allison, Comstock Resources (Tii:CRK)
Rutgers: Gregory Brown, Motorola Solutions (Tii:MSI)
USC: Oscar Munoz, United Airlines (Tii:UAL)
Purdue: Gregory Hayes, Raytheon (Tii:RTX)
North Carolina: Charles Robbins, Cisco Systems (Tii:CSCO)
Georgetown: James Farley, Ford (Tii:F)
Arkansas: C. Douglas McMillon, Walmart (Tii:WMT)
Texas: Gary Kelly, Southwest Airlines (Tii:LUV)
Competing in the Eastern Division was:
Michigan: Thomas Wilson, Allstate (Tii:ALL)
Houston: Richard Gonzalez, AbbVie (Tii:ABBV)
San Diego State: Walter Jelinek, Costco (Tii:COST)
Florida State: Bob Sasser, Dollar Tree (Tii:DLTR)
Colorado: Michael Wirth, Chevron (Tii:CVX)
Texas A&M: Greg Garland, Phillips 66 (Tii:PSX)
Syracuse: Michel Khalaf, MetLife (Tii:MET)
UCLA: Brian Cornell, Target (Tii:TGT)
In the first round, Target easily defeated leading insurer Allstate. In its second match, Target’s two-year return far exceeded that of Dollar Tree Inc., eliminating the discount retailer. In our Final Four matchup, Target again emerged triumphant against another insurer. MetLife's 32.4% three-year return wasn't enough to top Target's 167.1%, eliminating the insurance giant from further contention.
The road to the championship was a tough one for Ford. After knocking out Cisco Systems in the first round, the automaker faced Southwest Airlines. In a tough contest, Ford edged out the airline, setting up a Final Four showdown where a three-year return of 23.5% (Target’s lowest score at that point in the competition) was still strong enough to knock off Comstock Resources, thanks to a negative return of -17.5% for the energy company.
With the matches all settled, time is running out to let us know which team you cheered for and why to be entered for a chance to win one of four Benzinga.com Essential memberships for 12 months. That’s a $1400 value EACH. Click here to participate. See official terms.