We Expect to Raise Our Fair Value Estimate of Honeywell

Image: Honeywell’s Third Quarter 2020 Earnings Release Slide Deck By Brian Nelson, CFA With GE’s (GE) fall from grace years ago, Honeywell (HON) has taken the reigns as one of Valuentum’s top industrial ideas. That said, we don’t include Honeywell in any newsletter portfolio given weakening fundamentals and an increased net debt position, but it remains top of mind should our existing holdings start to register ratings on the Valuentum Buying Index that may start to point to some profit taking. Honeywell yields just north of 2%. We continue to expect our newsletter holdings to perform relatively better against a strengthening economic backdrop, and that means for us, Honeywell will remain on the bench. During Honeywell’s third quarter, results released … Read more

ICYMI — Dividend Growth Strategies Struggle

Image: A large cap growth ETF (orange) has significantly outperformed an ETF tied to a dividend growth strategy, the SPDR S&P Dividend ETF (SDY), which mirrors the total return performance of the S&P High Yield Dividend Aristocrats Index. — By Brian Nelson, CFA — To no surprise to many members, several dividend growth strategies have faced tremendous pressure during 2020. The Journal recently wrote a piece on the topic, but from our perspective, the problem with many dividend growth strategies is that they tend to be balance-sheet agnostic and pay little attention to traditional free cash flow expectations, focusing only on the yield itself, sometimes dismissing future fundamentals in favor of historical growth trends and the inferior EPS-based dividend payout ratio. — In many dividend-targeted … Read more

Lockheed Martin Beats Expectations and Raises Guidance Yet Again

Image Shown: Lockheed Martin continued to grow its revenues and segment operating profit in the third quarter of fiscal 2020. Image Source: Lockheed Martin Corporation – Third Quarter of Fiscal 2020 IR Earnings Presentation By Callum Turcan On October 20, Lockheed Martin Corporation (LMT) reported third quarter earnings for fiscal 2020 (period ended September 27, 2020) that beat consensus top- and bottom-line estimates. Lockheed Martin’s GAAP sales rose by 9% year-over-year, hitting $16.5 billion, in part due to the company increasing its F-35 aircraft deliveries to 31 in the fiscal third quarter from 28 in the same quarter last fiscal year. Additionally, all four of Lockheed Martin’s core business segments (‘Aeronautics,’ ‘Missiles and Fire Control,’ ‘Rotary and Mission Systems’ and … Read more

3 Lessons in Portfolio Management Over 10 Years

Dear members: — We’re finally getting a pause in the rapid ascent of the markets on September 3rd. Though headlines may look scary and momentum/volatility investors could start to pile on to the downside, a modest retracement is actually a good thing. We continue to focus on the long haul with our processes, and we’re viewing the sell-off as profit taking, for the most part. — In the near term, the markets will also have to digest some speculators betting on mean reversion between “value” (cyclical) versus “growth” (secular), but we maintain the view that the value-versus-growth conversation is largely nonsense (see block quotes below), and mean reversion is something akin to the gamblers’ fallacy, in my humble opinion. Investors should also continue … Read more

Valuentum Website Overview

Overview of the key features of valuentum.com/ (03:55). Valuentum (val∙u∙n∙tum) [val-yoo-en-tuh-m] Securities Inc. is an independent investment research publisher, offering premium equity reports, dividend reports, and ETF 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. The Benefits of Premium Membership >> Subscribe Now!

Lockheed Martin Secures Major Aircraft Order

Image Shown: Lockheed Martin Corporation’s ‘Aeronautics’ segment is its largest in terms of operating profit. Management boosted the firm’s operating profit guidance for fiscal 2020 during Lockheed Martin’s latest earnings report. Image Source: Lockheed Martin Corporation – Second Quarter of Fiscal 2020 IR Earnings Presentation  By Callum Turcan On August 14, the US Department of Defense (‘DoD’) awarded Lockheed Martin Corporation (LMT) a ten-year $62.0 billion contract covering the sale of F-16 aircraft to overseas buyers. This is an “indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity (‘IDIQ’), fixed-price-incentive contract” and it is possible the ultimate sales figure under this deal will be lower than $62.0 billion. In the press release announcing the contract, the DoD noted the initial delivery order covers 90 aircraft and that this … Read more

Lockheed Martin Raises Guidance

Image Shown: Lockheed Martin Corporation posted a strong fiscal second quarter earnings report which saw shares of LMT move higher over the following trading days. Image Source: Lockheed Martin Corporation – Second Quarter Fiscal 2020 IR Earnings Presentation By Callum Turcan On July 21, Lockheed Martin Corporation (LMT) reported second quarter fiscal 2020 earnings (period ended June 28, 2020) that beat both consensus top- and bottom-line estimates. Furthermore, Lockheed Martin boosted its guidance for fiscal 2020, even in the face of the ongoing coronavirus (‘COVID-19’) pandemic. Shares of LMT yield ~2.5% and are trading well below their fair value estimate of $432 per share as of this writing. We continue to like Lockheed Martin as a holding in the Dividend … Read more

Earnings Update: LMT, ISRG, KO, PM

By Brian Nelson, CFA We released a few preliminary thoughts on second quarter earnings in our note here, but we wanted to elaborate on a few new reports, too. Lockheed Martin (LMT) is included in the Dividend Growth Newsletter portfolio (login required), while Intuitive Surgical (ISRG) was highlighted as a COVID-19 play during the March swoon. Coca-Cola (KO) remains an excellent bellwether on the global economy, while Philip Morris (PM) remains a holding in the High Yield Dividend Newsletter portfolio (subscribe). Let’s cover the second quarter reports from these companies in this note. Lockheed Martin Achieves Record Backlog Things are looking good for Dividend Growth Newsletter portfolio holding Lockheed Martin. The company’s second-quarter results, released July 21, showed the defense … Read more

July Dividend Growth Newsletter

“The COVID-19 pandemic has all but shown it’s not the economy, or next quarter’s earnings, or last year’s book-to-market ratio or last year’s P/E ratio that drives market prices and returns; it’s enterprise valuation. Read about the duration of value composition in Value Trap.” — Brian Nelson, CFA — To add our new options commentary to your membership, please register here ($500/year). — Hi everyone!  — Trust you are doing great. I thought we could all share in on a little chuckle with this meme of Mr. T. I’ve been working for years and years explaining how important enterprise valuation, or the discounted cash flow process, is to understanding stock market prices and returns, and how most valuation ratios such as the P/E ratio, for example, … Read more

Valuentum Research Update

— Valuentum Research Update — Hi everyone! — Hope you all are doing great! I must say I couldn’t be more pleased with the research we’ve been putting out, and thank you very much for your continued interest. In this piece, I wanted to get some of our latest work to you.  — First, please note that we’ve done a great job holding the line on many of our fair value estimates (ranges) on our website. Many stocks have been bouncing back, and we’re glad we didn’t rush through any updates. Updating fair value estimates (ranges) too frequently doesn’t make much sense to us. We’re after the right answer, not any answer.  — Second, our team has been busy writing up some very … Read more