HSY
HERSHEY COEvidence as of 2026-09-03Overview · HERSHEY CO
The Hershey Company, together with its subsidiaries, engages in the manufacture and sale of confectionery products and pantry items in the United States and internationally. The company operates through three segments: North America Confectionery, North America Salty Snacks, and International. It offers chocolate and non-chocolate confectionery products; gum and mint refreshment products, including mints, chewing gum…
Management team
- Mr. Kristoffel Meulen · Chief Development OfficerFind on LinkedIn
- Ms. Jennifer L. McCalman · VP & Chief Accounting OfficerFind on LinkedIn
- Mr. Jason R. Reiman · Senior VP & Chief Supply Chain OfficerFind on LinkedIn
- Mr. Deepak Bhatia · Senior VP & CTOFind on LinkedIn
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Links open LinkedIn searches, not verified profiles. Team data from our market-data vendor's company profile.
Moneyta sentiment
Where the published evidence leans after the desk debated it — not a rating or a recommendation.
−0.1 on a −2 to +2 scale.
What builds the score
Solid bars are analyst rubric scores; faded bars are computed directly from data. Claims dropped in debate count for nothing; weakened claims count at half weight.
Editor's note
Written after the debate settled — the rest of the page is the evidence behind it.
The evidence balance is Mixed ( -0.1 of a possible +2; was -0.1 before debate) · confidence high. Revenue moved from 2,614,718,000 in Q2 2025 (fiscal quarter ended 2025-06-29) to 3,181,418,000 in Q3 2025 (fiscal quarter ended 2025-09-28), then to 3,104,167,000 in Q1 2026 (fiscal quarter ended 2026-03-29) and down to 2,787,306,000 in Q2 2026 (fiscal quarter ended 2026-06-28). Over the same sequence gross profit rose from 796,273,000 to 1,263,308,000 and operating income climbed from 192,811,000 to 642,641,000, while net income increased from 62,719,000 to 457,665,000.
Valuation metrics show trailing twelve-month P/E at 89.16, price-to-free-cash-flow at 25.35 and enterprise-value-to-EBITDA at 18.32 with trailing twelve-month EBITDA of 2,431,442,000 and trailing twelve-month free cash flow of 1,540,497,000; the model implies an after-tax free cash flow growth rate of 14.85% supported by the stated discount and terminal assumptions at the reference price of 177.43. Market signals are mixed: six-month price momentum is -22.9% (6th percentile) and twelve-month momentum is -2.4% (27th percentile), dividend yield ranks in the 83rd percentile, beta is -0.12 with correlation -0.06 to SPY, and recent volatility measures sit at the 73rd percentile of the universe.
How this note was made
every stage ran before the note was writtenAnalyst desk
Mercer, Oakes, Nash, Ellis, Yates, Talbot and Archer. The desk: named AI agents, not people. Each reads one slice of the evidence and nothing else — no outside knowledge, no browsing — so every finding traces to a source you can open.
Reads the XBRL figures companies file with the SEC — revenue, margins, income, debt and share count, quarter by quarter — and reports which way the trend is running.
Revenue was 2,614,718,000 for fiscal Q2 2025 (2025-03-31 to 2025-06-29, 3mo), rose to 3,181,418,000 in fiscal Q3 2025 (2025-06-30 to 2025-09-28, 3mo), then was 3,104,167,000 in fiscal Q1 2026 (2026-01-01 to 2026-03-29, 3mo) and fell to 2,787,306,000 in fiscal Q2 2026 (2026-03-30 to 2026-06-28, 3mo).
XBRL companyfacts · 0000047111-25-000112Gross profit was 796,273,000 in fiscal Q2 2025 (2025-03-31 to 2025-06-29, 3mo), 1,037,334,000 in fiscal Q3 2025 (2025-06-30 to 2025-09-28, 3mo), 1,222,731,000 in fiscal Q1 2026 (2026-01-01 to 2026-03-29, 3mo) and 1,263,308,000 in fiscal Q2 2026 (2026-03-30 to 2026-06-28, 3mo).
XBRL companyfacts · 0000047111-25-000112Reads the filings themselves, above all the year-over-year diff of Item 1A risk factors: which risks a company added, dropped or quietly reworded since its last annual report.
Which filings the desk reads
The desk reads the annual 10-K in full — its risk factors, and how they changed since last year. Quarterly 10-Qs and event filings (8-Ks, insider Form 4s) are listed for context but not read line by line: the 10-K is where the material risk disclosures live. A brand-new company, or one we have only just begun tracking, may have no annual report on file yet — its risk analysis fills in once that lands.
A Form 4 with the 4 filed 17 August 2026 was filed on 2026-08-17.
4 filed 2026-08-17A Form 4 with the 4 filed 19 August 2026 was filed on 2026-08-19 and its parse_status is listed as skipped in the evidence set.
4 filed 2026-08-19Reads the signal panel above — momentum, volatility, drawdown, relative strength and beta — and ranks each against the whole research universe rather than judging it in isolation.
Six-month price momentum is -22.9% and ranks in the 6th percentile of the 547-stock research universe as of 2026-09-02.
Moneyta signal set · 2026-09-02weakened in debateTwelve-month (12_1) momentum is -2.4% and ranks in the 27th percentile of the 547-stock research universe as of 2026-09-02.
Moneyta signal set · 2026-09-02weakened in debateReads which funds hold the name and at what weight, plus insider Form 4 filings, to show the exposure you may already carry through index funds.
HERSHEY CO appears as a holding in the IVV ETF at a weight of 0.04% as of 2026-09-02.
ETF constituents · market dataThere are five Form 4 filings for HSY clustered in August 2026: filed on 2026-08-17, 2026-08-19, 2026-08-24, 2026-08-26 and 2026-08-31.
Form 4 × 5 (90d window not enforced here)Reads recent headlines that are genuinely about this company, ignoring rating chatter and market-wide stories. Findings argue in the debate but never move the sentiment score.
The Hershey Company announced Dave Hulays as Chief Financial Officer, effective September 2, 2026.
News · prnewswire.com · 2026-09-02Multiple distinct outlets (gurufocus.com and at least two syndicated Yahoo posts) carried the CFO appointment story on September 2, 2026, indicating company-specific coverage picked up broadly.
News · gurufocus.com · 2026-09-02Reads parsed Forms 3/4/5 — who bought or sold, at what size, and whether a 10b5-1 plan was involved. Flags clustered open-market officer buying; treats plan sales as routine and never counts a fund or 10%-holder as an officer.
The Form 4 filed as insider:HSY:the 4 filed 24 August 2026 shows HERSHEY TRUST CO (a 10% owner) sold $1.3M for 7,180 shares and $96k for 519 shares on 2026-08-21, with each sale reported under a stated 10b5-1 plan.
Form 4 · HERSHEY TRUST CO TRUSTEE IN TRUST FOR MILTON HERSHEY SCHOOL (10% owner) · $96k sold · 2026-08-21The Form 4(s) filed as insider:HSY:the 4 filed 26 August 2026 show multiple sales by HERSHEY TRUST CO (a 10% owner) on 2026-08-24–2026-08-26 including $1.6M for 8,616 shares, $1.1M for 5,799 shares, $924k for 4,953 shares, $891k for 4,762 shares, and several smaller sales, each reported as executed pursuant to a stated 10b5-1 plan.
Form 4 · HERSHEY TRUST CO TRUSTEE IN TRUST FOR MILTON HERSHEY SCHOOL (10% owner) · $1.1M sold · 2026-08-26Reads the implied-expectations math built from the company's own filings (the growth rate today's price would justify, and the multiples beside it) and argues whether the market's bar looks high or low for this business. Never turns the math into a target.
The model implies an after-tax free cash flow growth rate of 14.85% that today's price would justify under the stated discount and terminal assumptions.
Valuation inputs · SEC XBRL + stored EOD closePrice-to-free-cash-flow on the trailing twelve months is 25.35.
Valuation inputs · SEC XBRL + stored EOD closeDebate and risk review
A bull and a bear contest the claims and the chair rules on each; the risk review stress-tests what survived.
A bull and a bear argue the analysts' claims across two rounds, then a chair rules on each one. Only what survives feeds the score — the argument is shown, not hidden, so you can judge the reasoning yourself.
The evidence set shows clear improvements in profitability metrics: gross profit (fundamentals-1), operating income (fundamentals-2) and net income (fundamentals-3) each rose substantially from mid-2025 into mid-2026, which is consistent with margin expansion even though reported revenue moved unevenly (fundamentals-0). Concurrent balance-sheet and capital-allocation items — declining long-term debt (fundamentals-4) and the resumption of share repurchases (fundamentals-5) — support an informational read that management has been strengthening financial flexibility. Market signals that can be framed positively include a relatively high trailing dividend yield (market-2) and low beta / low correlation to SPY (market-3), which some investors interpret as income plus diversification characteristics. Company-specific news (news-0, news-1, news-3) shows executive appointment coverage and product rollout activity, indicating visible corporate actions and media pickup. Taken together, these claims jointly support a favorable read grounded in improving profitability, active capital allocation and company-specific developments.
Chair's verdict, claim by claim
Fragility · computed, not argued
diversified0.26
34 surviving claims rest on 20 distinct sources; the heaviest analyst carries 18% of them, and 97% of what the desk raised survived the debate.
The surviving set is moderately robust: claims draw on two dozen distinct sources and no single analyst dominates the desk’s view, but a nontrivial fraction of claims come from a small number of filings and a single heavy analyst still carries meaningful weight. The very high debate-survival rate indicates internal consensus on the extracted facts, but source concentration around SEC filings and a few headline news items means the read should be treated as evidence-driven rather than broadly triangulated across many independent data types.
Peer context · computed, not argued
12-1 momentum ranks 2nd of 2 in Confectioners (as of 2026-09-02).
90-day volatility ranks 1st of 2 in Confectioners (as of 2026-09-02).
dividend yield ranks 1st of 2 in Confectioners (as of 2026-09-02).
Disconfirming evidence · base rates · falsifiers
Context
Outside consensus, and where this name already sits in your own portfolio.
Third-party consensus shown for context. It never enters Moneyta sentiment — when the two diverge, the debate above is where the why lives.
What this was built from
Every figure on this page traces to one of these. The desk reads only what is listed here — no outside knowledge, no browsing — and each card shows who read it and what it contributed to the score.
14 filings· 1 cited
SEC XBRL filings
Quarterly figures as filed with the SEC, read straight from EDGAR's structured data — not retyped or estimated.
Read by Mercer+0.7 to the score
5 documents· 2 cited
SEC filing documents
The filings themselves, including the year-over-year comparison of Item 1A risk factors.
Read by Oakes+0.0 to the score
1 signal set
Moneyta signal set
Computed from our own end-of-day price history and ranked against the whole research universe. No AI involved.
Read by Nash−0.1 to the score
2 holdings records
Fund holdings
Which funds hold this name and at what weight, plus insider Form 4 filings.
Read by Ellis+0.0 to the score
8 headlines· 2 cited
News coverage
Recent headlines about this company, rating chatter excluded and nothing published after the report date.
Read by Yatesnothing survived
3 filings· 2 cited
Insider filings
Parsed Forms 3/4/5 from EDGAR: named insiders, share counts, prices, and 10b5-1 plan state — stated and inferred flags kept apart.
Read by Talbot−1.0 to the score
1 computation
Valuation inputs
TTM cash-flow figures from the company's own XBRL filings, priced with the stored closing price. Implied growth and multiples only; no fair-value dollar figure reaches the desk, by design.
Read by Archercontext only
1 record· 0 cited
Company profile
Sector, industry and company details.
1 record· 0 cited
Analyst consensus
Third-party consensus, shown for context only — it never enters Moneyta sentiment.
Read means we pulled and handed it to an analyst; cited means a claim on this page points at it. Reading twelve quarters to state one trend is normal — the gap is shown rather than hidden.
Written by AI, checked against sources
The analysts, the bull–bear debate and the editor's note are AI agents reading only the evidence listed on this page. They can misread a filing or a headline, which is why every claim cites a source you can open and check yourself. The sentiment score is arithmetic over the claims that survived the debate, not a language model's opinion.
Educational analysis of published data. Moneyta does not give investment advice or make recommendations. Past patterns do not indicate future results.
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The full terminal on HSY Gold
Who holds it, who's buying, what the Street thinks: live behind the lock, updated as filings land.
Institutional holders
Net institutional flow, Q/Q
Largest holder position
Insider buys, 90 days
Clustered insider value
Street target range
The real figures are for members. Educational analysis, not advice.
Educational analysis of published data. Moneyta does not give investment advice or make recommendations.