donald trump is only making things more difficult for tiffany & co. the luxury retailer<u+2019>s flagship fifth avenue store is next door to trump tower, where the president-elect resides. protests and high security following the election have made it a nightmare to get anywhere in that part of manhattan. though a resulting decline in store traffic could crimp tiffany<u+2019>s holiday results, macroeconomic concerns could <u+201c>trump<u+201d> the physical disruption. but first up are its results, due tuesday, for the fiscal third quarter ended in october. after having ratcheted their expectations lower in recent months, analysts now forecast that tiffany earned 67 cents a share, down three cents from a year ago. this estimate was as high as 83 cents at the end of last year. revenue is expected to have fallen 1.5% to $924 million. tiffany shares have underperformed the s&p 500 by 6 percentage points this year. some of that is due to wall street<u+2019>s relatively tough times; bonuses are expected to fall for a third consecutive year and be about 5% to 10% smaller than a year ago, according to a report published earlier this month by consulting firm johnson associates inc. that presents another blow to the flagship fifth avenue store, which makes up about 10% of overall revenue. additionally, roughly 40% of those sales come from foreign tourists. tiffany has acknowledged that spending by overseas visitors, particularly from china, isn<u+2019>t as strong as it used to be. manhattan shopping splurges are far more costly due to the rising dollar , which last week hit a fresh 13-year high against major rivals. tiffany<u+2019>s same-store sales have declined for three consecutive quarters and four of the past six. analysts expect they dropped again in the third quarter, falling 4.1% from a year earlier. mr. trump isn<u+2019>t helping matters. analysts at cowen & co. estimate tiffany<u+2019>s fourth-quarter earnings could fall by three cents a share if store traffic dropped by 50% in the two weeks following the election.<u+00a0>and each additional week of protests and traffic disruption could lop another three to five cents a share off the bottom line. tiffany<u+2019>s jewelry isn<u+2019>t a bargain. neither is its stock price. fetching 20 times projected earnings over the next 12 months, tiffany<u+2019>s multiple is higher than average and richer than rivals lvmh mo<u+00eb>t hennessy louis vuitton se , burberry group plc and coach inc. steer clear of this rough cut. write to steven russolillo at steven.russolillo@wsj.com
trouble at tiffany, and donald trump isn<u+2019>t helping  - wsj
steven russolillo