Today we publish part 2 of 2 of the October 2021 edition of our proprietary McDonald’s Franchisee Survey. Much of this report focuses on how sales are going at present for the new-and-improved chicken sandwiches that McDonald’s launched in mid-Q1. Back in April 2021, during that iteration of our McDonald’s Franchisee Survey, we asked our franchisee respondents how many of the new-and-improved chicken sandwiches they were selling daily at their restaurants. At that time —

McDonald’s plans to release its Q3 earnings before the market open on Wednesday, October 27th. For Q3E, we retain our existing McDonald’s U.S. same-store sales forecast of +8.5%. According to Consensus Metrix data (as of this writing), sell-side consensus is at +8.2%. Our Q3E EPS estimate remains at $2.43. This is below consensus of $2.47, reflecting what we believe to have been sales challenges in China, rising commodity costs, and challenging wage inflation (in an