Dividend Increases/Decreases for the Week February 19

Below we provide a list of firms that raised their dividends during the week ending February 19. 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 Analog Devices (ADI): now $0.69 per share quarterly dividend, was $0.62. Arbor Realty Trust (ABR): now $0.33 per share quarterly dividend, was $0.32. ARC Document Solutions (ARC): now $0.02 per share quarterly dividend, was $0.01. CAI International (CAI): now $0.30 per share quarterly dividend, was $0.25. Canadian General Investments (CGRIF): now CAD 0.22 per share quarterly dividend, was CAD 0.21. Cimarex Energy (XEC): now $0.27 per … 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

Update: Frequently Asked Questions About Valuentum Securities, Inc.

What is Valuentum Securities? Valuentum (val∙u∙n∙tum) [val-yoo-en-tuh-m] Securities Inc. is an independent investment research publisher, offering premium equity reports and dividend reports, as well as commentary across all sectors/companies, a Best Ideas Newsletter (spanning market caps, asset classes), a Dividend Growth Newsletter, modeling tools/products, and more. Independence and integrity remain our core, and we strive to be a champion of the investor. Valuentum is based in the Chicagoland area. Valuentum is not a money manager, broker, or financial advisor. Valuentum is a publisher of financial information. How do I subscribe to Valuentum’s investment research services? 1)    Click the following link: signup-page. 2)    Select your membership plan. 3)    Enter your contact details. 4)    Click ‘Sign Up.’ 5)    Complete your purchase. 6)   Your payment profile may be recurring, so please check … Read more

Which Sectors Are Leading the Market Higher? And Why Is This Important?

Missed the ’13 Most Important Steps to Understand the Stock Market’? Click here. Demand academic evidence regarding the efficacy of the Valuentum process? Click here. Tobias J. Moskowitz and Mark Grinblatt documented the “strong and prevalent momentum effect in industry components of stock returns which accounts for much of the individual stock momentum anomaly” in their scholarly article published in the Journal of Finance, ‘Do Industries Explain Momentum’ (download here; stable link here; updated by Fraulo and Nguyen here). Moskowitz and Grinblatt also concluded that “industry momentum investment strategies, which buy stocks from past winning industries and sell stocks from past losing industries, appear highly profitable.” Such findings are consistent with the ‘Case for the Valuentum Style of Investing,’ and … Read more

The Best Years Are Ahead

By Brian Nelson, CFA — The wind is at our backs. — The Federal Reserve, Treasury, and regulatory bodies of the U.S. may have no choice but to keep U.S. markets moving higher. The likelihood of the S&P 500 reaching 2,000 ever again seems remote, and I would not be surprised to see 5,000 on the S&P 500 before we see 2,500-3,000, if the latter may be in the cards. The S&P 500 is trading at ~4,100 at the time of this writing. — The high end of our fair value range on the S&P 500 remains just shy of 4,000, but I foresee a massive shift in long-term capital out of traditional bonds into equities this decade (and markets … Read more

Nelson on Bogle, Part I

“The kind of commentary that makes broad generalizations about expectations of future returns is exactly why people are so eager to get into passive investment strategies. Since the 1920s, it seems as though the individual investor has assumed the stock market was rigged or impossible for average Joes to figure out, but instead of the “I’ll get it next time” mentality that was present leading to the crash of ’29, individual investors have “evolved” to the point that now the idea is if you can’t beat the market, just buy the whole thing. Leaders like Bogle continue to take tremendous shortcuts in explaining forecasts, leaving the average investor like a student trying to copy math homework off a peer that … Read more

The “Hierarchy” of Valuentum Idea Generation

Let’s talk about this hierarchy of idea generation in this note. —  A version of this article was sent to members previously. New content has been added.  — Note: We continue to work to optimize the signal-to-noise ratio in our work, and we are evaluating expanding our update cycle to half-year periods to better bolster the signaling aspects of the Valuentum Buying Index (VBI). In our widely-read case study (see here), the VBI showed its ability to rank equity returns over a forward 12-month period, and we think a migration to less-frequent updating may make the most sense to better capture the forward-looking dynamics of the system. We think this will help weed out false breakouts and other noise that could be harmful. You shouldn’t think of … Read more

The Dividend Cushion Meets the Dividend Aristocrats

By Brian Nelson, CFA At Valuentum, we know that forward-looking dividend analysis and opinion is all that matters for most income investors. That’s why we’ve provided the following screen of key constituents in the SPDR S&P Dividend ETF (SDY) and their forward-looking Dividend Cushion ratio. After all, the past is just the past. The future is what counts. The SPDR S&P Dividend ETF is a fund that tracks the the S&P High Yield Dividend Aristocrats Index, which is “designed to measure the performance of the highest dividend-yielding S&P Composite 1500 Index constituents that have followed a managed-dividends policy of consistently increasing dividends every year for at least 20 consecutive years.” To access either the 16-page stock report or the dividend report of each firm in the following modified ‘Aristocrats’ … Read more

5 Years Strong!

Image Source: Andy Maguire By Brian Nelson, CFA This month was an important one for our investment research firm, Valuentum, and its flagship newsletter, the Best Ideas Newsletter. The June 2016 edition means that we have now surpassed the 5-year anniversary of the inception of this newsletter’s portfolio (page 8). This is a critical time horizon that we and many others believe is a good one to assess the quality of any money manager. Money managers can be lucky or unlucky over very short periods of time, as in the case of perhaps a 12-24 month period, but those that can generate and retain outperformance over a 5-year period and longer typically are doing a lot of things right, even … Read more

Dividend Increases/Decreases for the Week February 18

Below we provide a list of firms that raised their dividends during the week ending February 18. 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 Acadia Realty Trust (AKR): now $0.18 per share quarterly dividend, was $0.15. Advance Auto Parts (AAP): now $1.50 per share quarterly dividend, was $1.00. AEGON (AEG): now EUR 0.09 per share semi-annual dividend, was EUR 0.08. AllianceBernstein (AB): now $1.29 per share quarterly dividend, was $0.89. Allstate (ALL): now $0.85 per share quarterly dividend, was $0.81. American Homes 4 Rent (AMH): now $0.18 per share quarterly … Read more