FedEx then and now: How the logistics company has evolved since 1971

Yahoo Finance's Jared Blikre discusses the origins of FedEx, how the company has changed over the years, and how the stock is performing this year.

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BRIAN SOZZI: September was a rough month all around for stocks, and one company in particular saw a significant drop after withdrawing its 2023 forecast, citing a volatile operating environment. We're talking about FedEx here, folks. And that's what Yahoo Finance's Jared Blikre joins us with today for another edition of "Then and Now." Jared.

JARED BLIKRE: That's right. Let's turn the clock back to the 1970s, where FedEx, or Federal Express, got its start-- founded in 1971 in Little Rock, Arkansas. The company officially began operations out of Memphis in '73. And fun fact-- the name Federal Express, it actually came about because the founder hoped it would attract the business of the Federal Reserve. It always comes back to the Fed, doesn't it, guys?

That original Memphis team consisted of fewer than 400 people. Yet, in its first night of operations, FedEx delivered 186 packages to 25 different countries-- or cities, excuse me. By 1975, FedEx started installing dropboxes, and we've been accustomed to seeing those in businesses. The overnight letter was introduced in 1981. And by 1983, FedEx made American history by becoming the first company to make $1 billion in revenue within 10 years of startup without mergers or acquisitions.

In 1978, FedEx went public on the New York Stock Exchange under the ticker that we know, FDX. And it IPO'ed at $24 per share. Split adjusted-- you got to divide by 32-- it is $0.75. Now, back to the present, we had that drastic mid-September drop of more than 20%. And now FedEx is trading around $155 per share, down more than 50% from its May 2021 record high near $320 per share.

So let's take a deep dive into where the company is right now. And on our Dow Jones heatmap-- actually, this is a transports, Dow Jones transports. Year to date, we can see FedEx down about 40%. If we sort by performance, we can see kind of towards the downside. In fact, only JetBlue-- not really a peer-- is down more than that. But you compare it to UPS, which is down 24%, and we do possibly have some execution issues.

Now, Brian, I know that you've been really following FedEx and especially its pre-- and especially its guidance as of that last huge drop right here and what it portends for the earnings season that we are about to jump into right now.

BRIAN SOZZI: Yeah, Jared, you really got the sense off of that FedEx warning that the economy is slowing down pretty sharply. But to your point, execution has been a big problem at this company maybe to an extent that hasn't been seen over the prior 25 years.

JARED BLIKRE: I got to tell you, you cover this space and these companies better than I do and more closely. But I just know that FedEx kind of releases outside the normal earnings window. And perennially, quarter after quarter, they cite these dollar effects problems. And that's just not just this year. This is going years back.

So I think there is a temptation to perhaps say that this is an idiosyncratic event. This is particular to that company. But you can't ignore the weight of the evidence-- excuse me-- with what we've seen of the earnings and the projections for them that we've seen so far. AMD the latest shot off the bow.

BRIAN SOZZI: Great work here, Jared. I really enjoy these. I know a lot of work goes into them. Thanks so much.