Dividend Increases/Decreases for the Week Ending August 9

Below we provide a list of firms that raised their dividends during the week ending August 9. 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 A&W Revenue Royalties Income Fund (AWRRF): now CAD 0.159 per share monthly dividend, was CAD 0.154. ALPS ETF Trust – Alerian Energy Infrastructure ETF (ENFR): now $0.3123 per share quarterly dividend, was $0.2875. Audio Codes (AUDC): now $0.12 per share semi-annual dividend, was $0.11. Badger Meter (BMI): now $0.17 per share quarterly dividend, was $0.15. Barret Business (BBSI): now $0.30 per share quarterly dividend, was $0.25. … Read more

Worst in Energy Not Over, Stay Away from Leveraged Enterprises, Seeds of Financial Crisis Sown?

Image Shown: The energy and banking markets continue to be experiencing pain. Since we removed the Energy Select Sector SPDR (XLE) and Financial Select Sector SPDR (XLF) from the Best Ideas Newsletter portfolio and Dividend Growth Newsletter portfolio, the XLE has fallen more than 50% and the XLF has fallen 13%, while the SPY has held up roughly 2%. We continue to believe staying away from energy and financials/banks will be a source of significant alpha. These are challenging times. The oil price swoon has complicated an already-dire situation with COVID-19. We’re seeing cracks in the credit markets, and the European banking system is far from healthy. The US banks may face knock-on impacts from energy loan defaults and hold … Read more

In The News: APU, EPD, MMP, OHI, PSA, O, TGE

We’re keeping a close eye on a number of high-yielding equities, and several have reported strong earnings during the calendar second quarter. By Kris Rosemann AmeriGas Partners Raises Adjusted EBITDA Guidance AmeriGas Partners (APU), the country’s largest retail propane marketer, turned in its best fiscal third quarter adjusted EBITDA performance since fiscal 2013 in the quarter ended June 30, 2018, results released August 1. Adjusted EBITDA advanced 15% from the year-ago period, and management subsequently raised its full-year fiscal 2018 EBITDA guidance to $625-$645 million from $610-$620 million. Retail volumes sold grew 4% in the quarter thanks to colder weather in April, which was partially offset by warmer months in May and June compared to the same period of fiscal … Read more

Historic Oil Deal Reached

Image Source: Chevron Corporation (CVX) – March 2020 Security Analyst Meeting Presentation By Callum Turcan Over the Easter holiday weekend, members from the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (‘OPEC’), non-OPEC members that are part of the OPEC+ group (countries that in the recent past have joined forces with OPEC to curtail global oil supplies in a formal manner), and non-OPEC members outside of the OPEC+ group such as Brazil (EWZ), Canada (EWC), and the United States (SPY) came to an agreement to cut their collective oil output by north of 10 million barrels per day. Global oil and other raw energy resource prices (USO, BNO) have been simply demolished year-to-date due to a combination of demand destruction from the ongoing … Read more

Energy Sector In Shambles, Looks to Recover But Headwinds Persist

Image Source: ConocoPhillips – November 2019 Analyst and Investor Meeting IR Presentation Executive Summary: Though raw energy resource pricing is on the rebound, the outlook for the oil and gas industry remains stressed. Global demand for oil and related refined petroleum products remains subdued due to headwinds generated by the ongoing coronavirus (‘COVID-19’) pandemic. The OPEC+ oil cartel has responded by pledging to keep a significant amount of oil output off the market for an extended time. However, raw energy resource prices need to go much higher and be sustained at elevated levels before the space could become attractive from a longer-term perspective. In our view, the US upstream industry (specifically those in the shale patch) need WTI to move … Read more

In The Name of Our Independence and Integrity…For Goodness Sake

Last week, an article was published that associated us with hedge funds, questioned our integrity as honest hard-working equity analysts with years of experience, dismissed our fantastic performance track record and Brian Nelson’s Chartered Financial Analyst designation, tarnished our independence as an equity research provider, and offered another author in free form the opportunity to misinterpret our completely independent and unbiased thesis and address it in ways of their preference, belittling our entire team at Valuentum and doing irreparable harm to our brand and image, in our vew. We were willing to let it go, but then another article ran in the print edition Saturday. First, let’s address the online piece, and the print piece subsequent to this. Valuentum’s thoughts … Read more

Black Gold! Crude Oil Prices Leap to ~$50

Key Takeaways: After being negative throughout much of the collapse in energy resource prices during 2014-2015, Valuentum has been market-neutral on the energy sector since October of last year, and the newsletter portfolios have participated in the bounce in energy shares from January 2016 via the Energy Select Sector SPDR (XLE). The Dividend Cushion ratio, which is a forward-looking cash-flow based metric of dividend health, flagged the risk of every dividend cut, without fail, in the Independent Oil & Gas industry in advance of the event: Anadarko (APC), Cenovus (CVE), Cimarex (XEC), Devon Energy (DVN), Noble Energy (NBL), and Range Resources (RRC). We’ll walk through the degree of capital cuts across the Independent Oil & Gas industry, the group’s efforts … Read more

Midstreams Going C-Corp, Should SEC Disallow the Measure Distributable Cash Flow?

Key Takeaways It’s important to differentiate the concept of enterprise free cash flow valuation and the idea of capital-market dependence. The uncertainty of the MLP business model remains, as it is clear operators are shunning the MLP business model preferring C-Corps instead. According to work from Global X Funds, now 40% of the energy infrastructure market cap consists of C-Corps, up considerably from just 15% at the end of 2014. Though many simplifications have come with implied distribution cuts, the primary reason for the rise in C-Corps across the midstream space has been the rationalizing of excess MLP valuations to enterprise free cash flow assessments. We encourage the SEC to consider disallowing the use of distributable cash flow, as it … Read more

Dividend Increases/Decreases for the Week Ending February 10

Below we provide a list of firms that raised/lowered their dividends during the week ending February 10. 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 3M Company (MMM): now $1.175 per share quarterly dividend, was $1.11. Alaska Air (ALK): now $0.30 per share quarterly dividend, was $0.275. Allstate (ALL): now $0.37 per share quarterly dividend, was $0.33. Archer Daniels Midland (ADM): now $0.32 per share quarterly dividend, was $0.30. Baldwin & Lyons (BWINA): now $0.27 per share quarterly dividend, was $0.26. Bank of Botetourt (BORT): now $0.14 per share quarterly dividend, … Read more

Dividend Increases/Decreases for the Week Ending February 9

Below we provide a list of firms that raised their dividends during the week ending February 9. 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 Allegion (ALLE): now $0.21 per share quarterly dividend, was $0.16. Allergan (AGN): now $0.72 per share quarterly dividend, was $0.70. Allstate (ALL): now $0.46 per share quarterly dividend, was $0.37. ALPS Alerian MLP ETF (AMLP): now $0.2066 per share quarterly dividend, was $0.2052. Anadarko Petroleum (APC): now $0.25 per share quarterly dividend, was $0.05. Archer Daniels Midland (ADM): now $0.335 per share quarterly dividend, was $0.32. … Read more