Their net (aka profit) was 8x year over year because their costs did not scale with revenue. Their 20% market share doesn't have anything to do with how their profit (as income minus costs) scales.
Based on info in the quarterly financial report, the revenue increase is 209%, not what the 109% the article says. Given their costs did not rise as fast as revenue, their profit margin this quarter was 32% over 8% the year before. However, it wasn't all roses as they indicate higher costs as well, example: "For the third quarter of fiscal 2023, feed costs per dozen were $0.679, a 20.8% increase compared with the third quarter of fiscal 2022."
Max Bowman, chief financial officer of Cal-Maine Foods, added, “Our financial results for the quarter were led by net sales of $997.5 million compared
with $477.5 million for the same period last year. Net income for the third quarter of fiscal 2023 was $323.2 million, or $6.62 per diluted share,
compared with $39.5 million, or $0.81 per diluted share, for the third quarter of fiscal 2022. [0]
If you flip it to capturing revenue of competitors, instead of profit, then sure the profit increase is explainable by typical market rules but it's no longer backing an alternative hypothesis they were "reaping the benefits of that effort by capturing the profit that would have been distributed across other operators" you're back to the original hypothesis of the article "profits were increased" just now you've explained how (revenue increased faster than expenses for a given product volume). What price gouging asks is if that profit increase is ethical not how it's explained to have occured. That is price gouging is a question of opinions of policy, one of which could certainly include "anything that follows the expected market behavior is ethical".
To be clear I don't consider this price gouging personally, I'm just not seeing why this is an alternative hypothesis to price gouging instead of a take on what qualifies as unethical or not.
Agreed, I think based on the numbers the alternative hypothesis fails. I also see how your point regarding market share is germane to the alt hypo.
The one way the alt hypo might succeed is if competitors' costs increased dramatically and overall output did not decrease. Let's say they had to pay for irregular flock refreshing and intensive facility maintenance. Maybe this disrupted throughput but not overall output. I kind of want to dig into other egg producers financials now, but I have to avoid the rabbit hole I got caught in yesterday.
Based on info in the quarterly financial report, the revenue increase is 209%, not what the 109% the article says. Given their costs did not rise as fast as revenue, their profit margin this quarter was 32% over 8% the year before. However, it wasn't all roses as they indicate higher costs as well, example: "For the third quarter of fiscal 2023, feed costs per dozen were $0.679, a 20.8% increase compared with the third quarter of fiscal 2022."
Max Bowman, chief financial officer of Cal-Maine Foods, added, “Our financial results for the quarter were led by net sales of $997.5 million compared with $477.5 million for the same period last year. Net income for the third quarter of fiscal 2023 was $323.2 million, or $6.62 per diluted share, compared with $39.5 million, or $0.81 per diluted share, for the third quarter of fiscal 2022. [0]https://calmainefoods.gcs-web.com/node/13221/pdf