Valuentum Exclusive Analysis for the Discerning Investor

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Nov 10, 2023

Use Both the Dividend Cushion Ratio (Probability of a Dividend Cut) and the Qualitative Dividend Ratings in Your Assessment of the Payout
The Dividend Cushion ratio ranks companies on the probability of a dividend cut in the longer run, while the qualitative ratings in part assess the outlook for the health of the payout in the near term in the context of management’s willingness to preserve and raise the payout. Since the systematic application of the Dividend Cushion ratio across our coverage in 2012, the Dividend Cushion ratio has forewarned readers of approximately 50 dividend cuts. We estimate its efficacy at ~90% at identifying the risks of a dividend cut in advance of the event.

Oct 22, 2023

There Will Be Volatility
Image: An ETF tracking Russell 1000 "growth" stocks has outperformed an ETF tracking Russell 2000 "value" stocks since the beginning of 2021. To us, the market remains hypersensitive to almost every economic data point that hits the wires, and we’re just not going to play that game. The macro headlines and never-ending news flow are what many quant and algorithmic traders are trading on, and to a very large extent, for investors with a long-term horizon, these macro data points just don’t factor into the equation. When valuing equities, we’re always after mid-cycle expectations, not peak or trough performance, so our valuations implicitly embed a "normal" recession. Warren Buffett didn’t become a billionaire buying and selling on macro data points, and volatility is simply to be expected given the proliferation of price-agnostic trading these days. Instead of panicking over higher interest rates, we think investors should view the Fed’s work thus far as future potential dry powder to stimulate both the economy and the markets. Whenever you feel like stocks are no good, have a read of Warren Buffett’s classic piece written during the Great Financial Crisis, “Buy American. I Am.” To us, we still like stocks for the long run. Happy investing!

Sep 20, 2023

ICYMI: Questions for Valuentum’s Brian Nelson
Valuentum's President Brian Nelson, CFA, answers your questions.

Sep 8, 2023

Our Latest Report Updates
Check out our latest report updates on the website.

Aug 3, 2023

Not Expecting Much From Consumer Staples Stocks
Image: Kellogg is representative of many consumer staples stocks that have considerable net debt positions. Image Source: Kellogg’s second-quarter press release. Though consumer staples equities have shown tremendous resilience in the face of adversity and their dividend yields can make sense in certain portfolios, the group is overflowing with net debt positions, meager long-term growth prospects, and free cash flow generation that is largely absorbed by growing per-share dividend liabilities. On the other hand, big cap tech and large cap growth have tremendous net cash positions and substantial future expected free cash flow generation, paving the way for what could be considerable long-term return potential. As with the last decade, we expect cash-based sources of intrinsic value to prevail, and for that, we continue to point to big cap tech and large cap growth as areas for consideration.

Jul 11, 2023

An Important Measure of Leverage for Dividend-Growth and Income-Oriented Shareholders, One That Is Dividend-Adjusted
As more and more investors rely on company dividends for income, dividends, in our view, have become more debt-like commitments in nature, especially from the perspective of dividend-growth or income-oriented shareholders. Years ago, we rolled out a measure of financial leverage that considers both the company’s debt and the present value of its future expected cash dividend obligations, which, in the eyes of die-hard dividend-growth or income-oriented shareholders, may be implicitly assumed to be debt-like commitments in substance. We think this leverage ratio can be used in conjunction with the Dividend Cushion ratio to gain additional insight into the dividend-paying financial health of an entity.

May 30, 2023

Paper: Value and Momentum Within Stocks, Too
Abstract: This paper strives to advance the field of finance in four ways: 1) it extends the theory of the “The Arithmetic of Active Management” to the investor level; 2) it addresses certain data problems of factor-based methods, namely with respect to value and book-to-market ratios, while introducing price-to-fair-value ratios in a factor-based approach; 3) it may lay the foundation for academic literature regarding the Valuentum, the value-timing, and ultra-momentum factors; and 4) it walks through the potential relative outperformance that may be harvested at the intersection of relevant, unique and compensated factors within individual stocks.

Mar 24, 2023

How the Payment of a Dividend Impacts Intrinsic Value Estimation
"Dividends are a transfer of cash to the shareholders that the shareholders already owned."In this purely educational article, using historical data from 3M, let’s walk through the mechanics of how the payment of a dividend impacts the intrinsic value of a company. The takeaways may be somewhat counterintuitive but are nonetheless very important for members to understand.

Mar 23, 2023

The Dividend Cushion Ratio: Unadjusted Is Less Subjective, Adjusted Is More Subjective
Image Source: Mike Lawrence. Question: I'm a subscriber. I'm looking at your Dividend Report for Enterprise Product Partners. It says your Valuentum Adjusted Dividend Cushion ratio for EPD is 1.8 (a ratio that includes future expected proceeds from capital raising endeavors in the coming years), but several lines below it says the Unadjusted Dividend Cushion ratio, which is your regular normal ratio (a ratio that does not include future expected proceeds from capital raising endeavors in the coming years), is 0.22. Please explain the difference between the two ratios, and what is considered a good ratio for the Unadjusted Dividend Cushion ratio, what is an excellent score, what is neutral and what is poor? Also, how much relative importance should I give to each ratio? Also, further down in the section on Unadjusted Dividend Cushion, the chart of EPD has a large negative number in the blue bar, and your text says: "Generally speaking, the greater the 'blue bar' to the right is in the positive, the more durable a company's dividend, and the greater the 'blue bar' to the right is in the negative, the less durable a company's dividend." So that means that EPD's dividend isn't durable, yet your report earlier says that EPD's Dividend Safety rating is GOOD. Can you elaborate?

Feb 19, 2023

Our Reports on Stocks in the Recession Resistant Industry
Image Source: Mike Mozart. Our reports on stocks in the Food Retailing industry can be found in this article. Reports include BUD, CL, CLX, CPB, COST, FDP, GIS, HRL, K, KDP, KHC, KMB, KO, KR, MDLZ, MKC, MO, PEP, PG, PM, SJM, TAP, TGT, TSN, WMT, CHD, SYY, ADM, LANC, CASY.