SEC Approves Financial Weapon of Mass Destruction and More Earnings Reports

Let’s talk about quadruple-leveraged ETFs, Apple’s and Altria’s earnings reports, Coach’s fundamental improvement, Gilead’s fall from grace, IBM’s ongoing deterioration and more. By Brian Nelson, CFA Well, it is what it is as they say. In our ETF research and analysis, we consistently warn readers about the long-term price erosion dynamics of ultra-leveraged ETFs (of the double and triple variety), vehicles that we have emphasized are for “day traders,” not long-term investors. Believe it or not, however — we received news May 3 that the SEC approved a request to now list quadruple-leveraged ETFs, what we describe to be “financial weapons of mass destruction.” Yikes. You read that correctly–quadruple-leveraged exchange traded funds, ones that mimic the movement of the index … Read more

Dividend Increases/Decreases for the Week April 22

Below we provide a list of firms that raised their dividends during the week ending April 22. 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      AmeriServ Financial (ASRV): now $0.03 per share quarterly dividend, was $0.025. Banco Santander-Chile (BSAC): now $0.909 per share dividend, was Ch$1.64751729. Bar Harbor Bankshares (BHB): now $0.26 per share quarterly dividend, was $0.24. CapStar Financial (CSTR): now $0.10 per share quarterly dividend, was $0.06. Compania Cervecerias Unidas S.A. (CCU): now $0.3084 per share quarterly dividend, was $0.309 per share semi-annual dividend. Compania de Minas Buenaventura (BVN): … Read more

VBI Ratings Not as Impressive As We Would Have Liked in 2022

Image: How the VBI rating system has ranked equities so far this year. By Brian Nelson, CFA At Valuentum, we use the Valuentum Buying Index (VBI) to source ideas into diversified simulated newsletter portfolios, and the VBI may be most applicable to the simulated Best Ideas Newsletter portfolio, where we generally like to include ideas when they register a high VBI rating and remove them when they register a low VBI rating. We always use the VBI in a portfolio setting and never by itself. But what about the Valuentum Buying Index ratings, themselves? How did they “perform” during 2022 in one of the worst years for stock market investors in history? Well, not as spectacular as we would have … Read more