However, on the company’s first-quarter earnings call, CEO Russell Weiner made it clear that one franchise is weighing heavily on Domino’s <\/strong>(DPZ) global results<\/strong>.\u00a0<\/p>\n Let’s dive deeper. <\/p>\n Domino’s international same-store salesfell 0.4% in Q1<\/strong>, compared to an increase of 3.7% <\/strong>in the same period a year ago. On the surface, the reversal appears to be a broad international slowdown.\u00a0<\/p>\n The reality, according to Weiner and Chief Financial Officer Sandeep Reddy, is far more specific.<\/p>\n The culprit is Domino’s Pizza Enterprises<\/strong>, or DPE, the company’s largest international franchisee<\/strong>, which operates across Australia, Europe, Japan, and several other markets. <\/p>\n UCG/ Getty Images<\/p>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n DPE has been struggling for years<\/strong> to get its value equation right and restart order count growth<\/strong>.<\/p>\n “If you took out DPE, the rest of our international business performed exactly as we had hoped it would for the quarter,” Weiner said on the call.<\/p>\n That’s a blunt assessment. And it puts a sharper lens on what’s a bifurcated international story<\/strong>: a DPE problem atop an otherwise healthy global business.<\/p>\n The European segment, led by the U.K., was a bright spot. So was the Americas’ international business. <\/p>\n Strip DPE from the equation, and Domino’s international arm hits its targets<\/strong>.<\/p>\n The DPE franchise<\/strong> has been a headwind for Domino’s international results for roughly three years<\/strong>. <\/p>\n Related: Troubled pizza restaurant franchisee files Chapter 11 bankruptcy<\/strong><\/p>\n Its issues are operational: value offerings haven’t landed well with consumers, and the business hasn’t been able to drive the order-count growth that fuels same-store sales.<\/p>\n A new CEO, Andrew Gregory, is set to start at DPE in August. Weiner said he remains in close contact with Jack Cowin<\/strong>, DPE’s executive chairman, and that the two spoke as recently as the week of the earnings call.<\/p>\n Weiner explained:<\/p>\n “We’ve got contractual powers that we can leverage as well to drive change, and we’re going to be doing all of those things.”\u00a0<\/p>\n The long-term opportunity in DPE’s markets<\/strong>, Australia, Japan, and parts of Europe, is simply too big to walk away from, Weiner argued.<\/p>\n The growth is real, and DPE’s drag is just obscuring it.<\/p>\n Domino’s revised its full-year 2026 international same-store sales guidance<\/strong> to low single-digit growth, down from the prior outlook. <\/p>\n Reddy cited macro and geopolitical uncertainty as key factors behind the cut.<\/p>\n Weiner’s long-term view hasn’t changed. He pointed to 11 consecutive years of U.S. market share gains<\/strong>, more than 2,000 net-new stores over that stretch<\/strong>, and average franchisee profits up by nearly $80,000 per store<\/strong> as proof that the Domino’s model works.<\/p>\n But right now, one big international franchise is making that story harder to tell. And the CEO is done pretending otherwise.<\/p>\n Down 42% from all-time highs, Domino\u2019s is valued at a market cap of $11 billion<\/strong>. Analysts tracking the restaurant stock forecastadjusted earnings per share<\/strong> to expand from $17.57 per share in 2025 to $28.87 per share in 2030.\u00a0<\/p>\n If DPZ stock is priced at 16x forward earnings<\/strong>, which is below the 10-year average of 29x, it could gain 32% within the next four years. If we adjust for dividends, cumulative returns could be closer to 45%.\u00a0<\/p>\n Out of the 22 analysts covering Domino\u2019s stock, 13 recommend \u201cBuy\u201d, eight recommend \u201cHold,\u201d and one recommends \u201cSell\u201d. The average DPZ stock price target is $419, which is 26% above current levels.<\/p>\n Related: Domino\u2019s Pizza CEO flags why consumer demand is suddenly slipping<\/strong><\/p>\n #Domino039s #CEO #issues #blunt #message #growing #problem<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Domino’s Pizza had a complicated first quarter. In the U.S., the pizza giant kept growing its order count and gained market share. However, on the company’s first-quarter earnings call, CEO… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2219,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[246],"tags":[1896,369,3963,872,1238,267,766],"class_list":["post-2218","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-popular","tag-blunt","tag-ceo","tag-domino039s","tag-growing","tag-issues","tag-message","tag-problem"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gw.adampg777.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2218","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/gw.adampg777.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/gw.adampg777.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gw.adampg777.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gw.adampg777.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2218"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/gw.adampg777.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2218\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gw.adampg777.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/2219"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gw.adampg777.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2218"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gw.adampg777.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2218"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gw.adampg777.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2218"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Why international sales missed the mark<\/strong><\/h2>\n
![](\"https:\/\/www.thestreet.com\/.image\/NDA6MDAwMDAwMDAyOTg1NjY4\/dominos-pizza-restaurant-storefront-featuring-a-large-sign-with-the-company-logo-little-india-kuala-lumpur-malaysia-asia-food-delivery-motorbike.jpg?io=1&profile=rss\"){kind=logo}
DPE has been a drag on Domino\u2019s<\/strong><\/h2>\n
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What the updated outlook signals for DPZ stock\u00a0<\/strong><\/h2>\n
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Is DPZ stock undervalued?<\/strong><\/h2>\n