McDonalds (NYSE:MCD) is warning investors today, yet share price is on the rise. When cheap is good, this is a great company to have in your portfolio. Fortunately, cheap has never been more popular.

I did something last Friday that I have not done in years and I am embarrassed to admit it. If you live on the East Coast, you know we just experienced a beautiful weekend. After a long, cold winter, a warm breeze was a refreshing reminder spring is just weeks away.

Normally, when my wife gets a craving for ice cream, I mutter my disdain and half-heartedly go along for the ride. I would rather eat a steak over ice cream any day. But when the weather was that nice and the weekend so promising, I jumped on the occasion.

But here is where it gets a little embarrassing. Instead of taking her to one of the trendy ice cream joints in town, I pulled up to the McDonald’s (NYSE:MCD) drive-thru window.

$2.12 later, we had two hot fudge sundaes and were on our way. That’s just about the price we would have paid for handful of sprinkles at any of the other joints.

The price made me happy. The sugar and cream made her happy. It was the start of a great weekend.

Cheap when cheap is good

Multiple my experience by several million people across the globe and you start to see why McDonalds has been making it shareholders rather happy over the last six months. While everybody else is failing, the company’s incredible scale and marketing savvy is keeping it on an level keel even through a hurricane of a recession.

But today the company is warning investors its first quarter may not be as appetizing as the last few. A strong dollar and rising commodity costs are impacting its earnings and its margins. With expectations of Q1 sales to be off by close to $600 million over the same period last year, the company says the adverse currency and commodity conditions will take as much as $0.09 per share off of this quarter’s earnings.

Investors should not be worried about the news. It is certainly no surprise.

February appears to have been a strong month for the company. Overall, global same-store sales rose by a calendar-adjusted 5.4%, helping to prove more folks are flocking to the restaurant’s low-priced menu.

For investors, this is a good time to start looking at shares of the company. While share price is far from joining companies like Citigroup (NYSE:C) and General Motors (NYSE:GM) on the dollar menu, they are quite the value. McDonald’s has not traded this cheaply in nearly two years.

If you are looking to get rich quick, this is not the investment for you. But if you want a shot at double-digit profits and reduced risk, take a look at McDonalds.

Consumers have taken advantage of the low menu prices. Now investors have the opportunity to take advantage of low share prices.

Source: Tightwad Investing: McDonalds rules the value menu