Brian Nelson

Dividend Increases for the Week Ending November 7

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Below we provide a list of firms that raised their dividends during the week ending November 7. The dividend reports of covered firms on this list will be updated shortly with the new information. To access our dividend reports use the ‘Symbol’ search box in our website header. Firms Raising Their Dividends This Week Aaron’s (AAN): now $0.023 per share quarterly dividend, was $0.021. Acadia Realty Trust (AKR): was $0.24 per share quarterly dividend, was $0.23. Agrium (AGU): now $0.78 per share quarterly dividend, was $0.75. Atmos Energy (ATO): now $0.39 per share quarterly dividend, was $0.37. AmTrust Financial Services (AFSI): now $0.25 per share quarterly dividend, was $0.20. Cantel Medical (CMN): now $0.05 per share semi-annual dividend, was $0.045. … Read more

Sears Has Stopped Shrinking But Is This Really Good News?

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It appears that when things at a company are so bad, any glimmer of hope can result in an outsize upside stock-price reaction that is often unjustified on the basis of fundamentals. This appears to be what happened to Sears’ (SHLD) stock last week. The company was at the center of a massive short squeeze Friday, to a magnitude we haven’t seen in some time. We don’t think fundamentals at Sears have changed all that much. The struggling retailer said that EBITDA in the third quarter of 2014 would be equally as poor as that of the same period in 2013. The measure could be a $325 million loss (-$325 million) in the quarter, and this would be worse than the $178 … Read more

4 Friday Earnings Reports for Your Radar

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Let’s dig into a number of reports from firms in the news Friday.   Abercrombie & Fitch (ANF)   Investors in teen retail stocks are literally trying to catch lightning with respect to fashion trends. Predicting fashion in any demographic isn’t easy, but we’d point to anticipating teen behavior as the most difficult analytical proposition within any retail segment. It shouldn’t be surprising that fundamentals within the teen retail space are volatile, and Abercrombie & Fitch’s third-quarter update matched such a profile. During the period, net sales in its third quarter fell 12% and comparable store sales dropped 10%.   From the release: Sales during the quarter were below expectations with comparable sales in September and October being significantly weaker … Read more

Third Quarter Earnings Season Pushes Forward

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The equity markets continue to propel higher despite what we would describe to be a mixed third-quarter earnings season. Let’s walk through a number of earnings reports from popular companies reporting so far this week. Some of them we include in the newsletter portfolios. Others we don’t. But all are worth keeping tabs on. Annaly (NLY) Annaly is a mortgage REIT (mREIT) with principal business objective to generate net income for distribution to shareholders. Being critical of the mREIT business is certainly unpopular, and we understand that many retirees generate vital income streams from such investments. Bulls and bears, however, both benefit from our independent voice, and we call out risks as we see them. Annaly and American Capital Agency … Read more

Sprint Falls Back Down to Under $5 Per Share

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To us, there really never was an investment case for Sprint (S). Let us explain. In investing, the “capital stack” represents the firm’s capital structure, beginning with net debt at the bottom and moving up to equity at the top. In order for any firm to have any equity value, the present value of its risk-adjusted future free cash flows must sum to a value greater than its net debt. The hypothetical firm shown below in the image has equity value because the present value of its risk-adjusted future free cash flows is greater than the sum of its net debt. At Valuentum, we spend most of our time paying attention to the firm’s regulatory filings. In Sprint’s most recent … Read more

Alibaba Still Has Upside to $125+ Per Share

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Warren Buffett (BRK.A, BRK.B) hasn’t bought an initial public offering (IPO) in fifty years. The Oracle of Omaha has often said that IPOs are almost always bad investments, which may often be the case. Such a view is great guidance for new and inexperienced investors, but the key word of emphasis in his view is ‘almost.’ Some IPOs are, in fact, worth looking into. Remember: an asset in any form can be mispriced, whether it is a house, rental car, piece of equipment, secondary stock sale, and yes, even an IPO. An asset’s value in any and all cases will be the present value of risk-adjusted future free cash flows after accounting for the current balance sheet net cash/debt position … Read more

AIG Still Our Best Idea in Insurance

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Members know that we’re not fans of the investment prospects of the insurance industry, but they also know that we have liked American International Group (AIG) for some time. We were saying that shares were attractive as early as November 2012, and we reiterated the opinion that AIG was our favorite idea in the insurance industry in November 2013. Today, the company registers a 9 on the Valuentum Buying Index, and . Shares closed at $53.80 each yesterday. AIG reported excellent third-quarter results that revealed outperformance relative to expectations on both the top and bottom lines. Third-quarter after-tax operating income advanced 23% to $1.7 billion, or $1.21 per diluted share (up from $0.96 in the year-ago period). AIG noted that … Read more

How About Teva Pharmaceuticals?

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We care very much about our members. We listen to every comment. We read every email. We take everything to heart. We know we’re not supposed to, but we can’t help but be passionate about our work. We strive for your success, and we take failure personally. There are some investors that want our best ideas to work out yesterday. That’s just not going to happen. Aside from yesterday being in the past, our best ideas tend to work out over a 12-24 month time period. This is a reasonable time period to expect price-to-fair-value convergence on stocks with good momentum. From our experience, this is the time period in which the Valuentum process has its greatest efficacy, and no … Read more