PepsiCo, Inc. (PEP): Jim Cramer Reveals - "Stock Had Been Prepped" From Negativity

We recently published Jim Cramer’s Surprised About US Travel As He Discusses These 18 Stocks. In this article, we are going to take a look at where PepsiCo, Inc. (NASDAQ:PEP) stands against other stocks that Jim Cramer discussed.

In a recent appearance on CNBC’s Squawk on the Street, Jim Cramer commented on the growing amount of stock buybacks and how the buybacks during April-May were the third best historically of the year. “Well, I’ll tell ya, the banks are the ones that are going to do it. They’re gonna start it and the banks have an appetite for their stock that is crazy,” he said.

Cramer also commented on President Trump’s senior counselor for trade and manufacturing, Peter Navarro. Navarro is an ardent believer in the trade imbalance that the US faces abroad and Cramer agrees with the assessment. “Well, Peter’s got, strong views. Peter’s a person with strong views,” according to Cramer.

Despite the fact that markets were roiled in April due to the President’s tariff announcements, when his co-host remarked that Navarro might not have the President’s ear, Cramer replied: “Well if that’s the case, death by China is winning right now. And death by China is Navarro.”

Another news bite that was brought up on the show was the decline in foreign arrivals in the US and the President saying the decline in foreign arrivals wasn’t a big deal. Cramer agrees with Trump as he said:

“So far, not. I think that the dollar being cheap for the first time in our lifetime is gonna make people. . .but when you listen to Proctor, you’re very conscious of the fact that the dollar’s weak and IBM and I think that people in the end, they’ll be excited. Excited to come to a place where the dollar’s finally not crushing them. And that does matter.”

However, he added:

“Well look, it’s not, obviously I think that there’s issues involving our country and how people view us and, look, you don’t need me to tell which way the wind blows. But I would have thought there would have been more weakness in travel. I’m just surprised that it’s just not bad.”

Our Methodology

To make our list of the stocks that Jim Cramer talked about, we listed down the stocks he mentioned during CNBC’s Squawk on the Street aired on April 24th.

For these stocks, we also mentioned the number of hedge fund investors. Why are we interested in the stocks that hedge funds pile into? The reason is simple: our research has shown that we can outperform the market by imitating the top stock picks of the best hedge funds. Our quarterly newsletter’s strategy selects 14 small-cap and large-cap stocks every quarter and has returned 373.4% since May 2014, beating its benchmark by 218 percentage points (see more details here).

PepsiCo, Inc. (NASDAQ:PEP)

Number of Hedge Fund Holders In Q4 2024: 69

PepsiCo, Inc. (NASDAQ:PEP) is a well-known American food and beverage firm. Cramer has discussed the firm several times in his morning show. In several of these, he has praised PepsiCo, Inc. (NASDAQ:PEP)’s CEO Ramon Laguarta and commended his appreciation of the fact that weight loss drugs change the firm’s market dynamics. Here are his latest comments about PepsiCo, Inc. (NASDAQ:PEP):

“PepsiCo, by the way, Ramon Laguarta, I bet you that stock is barely down, because that stock had been prepped, from a level of negativity. Yeah, it’s not even down. A level of negativity you can’t believe. And when you speak to Ramon, can I just say, Ramon who I happen to like very much . . .Ramon is one of guys who has to accept the fact that we have a secretary of health and human services that is basically just saying you gotta get a lot of beetroot, you gotta get a lot of natural colors. And remember, PepsiCo, Pepsi, like Coke, it’s got a kind of yellow. A yellow that David, frankly, there are other liquids that are yellow.”

“I think Ramon’s got the toughest hand of anybody that we’re going to see today and he’s doing the best with it. Okay. He has the toughest hand. He has a health and human services guy who wants to take the color out of everything that they make, okay. Now Doritos, I mean Doritos’ got a little stuff that makes it look a little more hot than the other guy. So you got to figure out how to make something look hot without. . .and do it naturally.”

“Also when you hear that potato chips are a discretionary item in people’s diet. What it says is people are very, very worried. They’re very worried about their job. And I’ve never equated a small bag of chips. . .I have never equated that with economic uncertainty.”

“I am saying that when you listen to the food guys and they are talking about how people are nervous and they’re cutting back on eating. When I’m nervous, I eat more. . . .who cuts back on eating. . .I eat a lot less because I’m nervous, who says that?”

Overall, PEP ranks 12th on our list of stocks that Jim Cramer discussed. While we acknowledge the potential of PEP as an investment, our conviction lies in the belief that some AI stocks hold greater promise for delivering higher returns and doing so within a shorter time frame. There is an AI stock that went up since the beginning of 2025, while popular AI stocks lost around 25%. If you are looking for an AI stock that is more promising than PEP but that trades at less than 5 times its earnings, check out our report about this cheapest AI stock.

READ NEXT: 20 Best AI Stocks To Buy Now and 30 Best Stocks to Buy Now According to Billionaires.

Disclosure: None. This article is originally published at Insider Monkey.