While the market falls to multi-year lows (not today though!), and the demand for Treasuries is out of sight, the contrarian in me wants to find an alternative. I want to find companies that pay good dividends and have the solid cash flow to keep paying them. I want better than the 30 year yield on Treasury Bonds and stocks that are on or near their 12-month lows.
Commodities and affiliated industries fit the bill right now. With oil and most commodities in the basement (except gold) it is worth looking at this group in detail. I will sort the market for stocks that fit this description and rearrange the landscape for my custom metric "Solid Dividends".
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My metric focuses on steady history of dividend payouts, EPS growth and strong cash flow coverage. I run my metric across commodity stocks - and there are quite a few standouts (in blue). The next step is to sort by stocks closest to their 12-month lows which in our example are closest to the left hand edge of each sector. Most of my top picks happen to be trading close to their 12-month lows even though only 2 of the 6 metrics are price related (Dividend Yield, 5 year Avg and Dividend Yield).
By looking at the Dow Jones News History, I found that these companies h ave either recently raised or reaffirmed their dividend or bought back shares. Simple but nice confirmations and you can get them on or near their lows.
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MRO - Marathon Oil Corp.
CVX - Chevron Corp.
CRS - Carpenter Technology Corp.
CRR - CARBO Ceramics Inc.
RPC - RPC Inc.
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