Rambus Chips, Coach Bags Risk Japan Sales Drop After Quake

Rambus Chips, Coach Bags Risk Japan Sales Drop After Quake

Aflac Inc. (AFL) insurance, Rambus Inc. (RMBS) memory-chip interfaces and Coach Inc. (COH) leather handbags are among the products from U.S. companies at risk for lost sales in Japan after the country’s worst earthquake ever. Japan generated about 75 percent of Aflac’s 2010 sales, the most among U.S.-based companies with a market value of at least $100 million, according to data compiled by Bloomberg golf practice drills. At least 35 companies including Rambus, Coach and jewelry-maker Tiffany & Co. (TIF) had 15 percent or more of sales from Japan, the data show. Quake disruptions range from “substantial” damage to a Texas Instruments Inc. (TXN) plant in Miho, Japan, that will hurt sales in two quarters to possible shifts in consumer behavior as the world’s third-wealthiest nation rebuilds. Coach and Tiffany said they both had shut some stores in Japan. “Even for consumers who have the means, they may not be in the mood to open up their wallets and spend conspicuously,” said Lawrence Creatura, a Rochester, New York-based fund manager at Federated Investors Inc. (FII), which oversees about $360 billion. U.S. manufacturers whose Japanese corporate customers are idled by the March 11 earthquake and tsunami in the northern part of the country are among those that may feel the pinch most quickly. Concern that a damaged nuclear plant may experience a meltdown is weighing on investors and consumers. Rambus’s biggest sources of Japanese sales include Toshiba Corp. (6502) and Elpida Memory Inc. (6665), both of which have had some plant shutdowns, and Sony Corp. (6758), said Jeff Schreiner, a Capstone Investments Inc. analyst in San Diego Newest Golf News about Hunter Mahan. In 2010, 36 percent of Sunnyvale, California-based Rambus’s sales came from Japan. A spokeswoman, Linda Ashmore, declined to comment. Aflac Insurance Aflac, the supplemental health-insurance company, has been in Japan since the 1970s, according to its website. The Columbus, Georgia-based company said yesterday it was keeping its forecast for 2011 operating earnings unchanged “at the low end” of an 8 percent to 12 percent increase. “We expect Aflac Japan sales will only be minimally impacted by these events,” Aflac said in a statement hours before it fired comedian Gilbert Gottfried, the voice of its duck mascot in the U.S., after comments he made about tsunami victims. The temblor’s drag on the economy may be greater than that of the Kobe earthquake in 1995, Shun Maruyama, a Credit Suisse AG equity strategist in Tokyo, said yesterday in a report. “We also expect consumers to curb consumption for a long period across a wide swath of the country, including the Tokyo metropolitan area,” Maruyama said.