Friday Night Round Table

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Greetings everyone!  Today marks the end of the last official week of January and I wanted to share my thoughts on currently "big" companies that are undervalued or the stock price has taken a large hit recently, thus offering a higher yield than usual.  To begin my brief discussion we will start with:

Johnson and Johnson (JNJ): A dividend Aristocrat, their stock has dropped around $3 due to recalls on products, lawsuits being filed as well as a decrease in revenue and profits, year over year.  However, from a company standpoint - keeping your investors happy is what they need to do in this situation, thus their dividend, in my opinion, still stands strong and they have excess cash in storage.  Their price at $60.01, brings their yield to 3.60%; which based on my analysis 4 weeks ago, they had a yield of 3.49%.  Thus, it is an even more attractive investment for new/current shareholders.

Intel (INTC): Even after their stock price surged close to $22 after they announced their stock buyback plan and dividend increase, they had a pullback today, thus finishing off at $21.46 per share with a current yield of 3.37%.  With my previous article about INTC, their yield was 2.99%, thus it is much higher.

WWE (WWE): You read it.  The World Wrestling Entertainment has taken a beating due to disappointing earnings guidance.  However, with a dividend yield of 12.03% and the Royal Rumble coming and Wrestlemania, my brothers (die hard fans) say that this should help the company's revenue and that the loyal fan base is still there.  It will be interesting to see what will happen.  They are priced at $11.97, which is around $2 - $2.50 less than what it has normally traded at over the last 52 weeks or so.

AT&T (T): This is difficult.  Despite solid results, Verizon (VZ) and the Apple's (AAPL) iPhone seem to extremely threaten good old AT&T.  Their price has plummeted as well, finishing the week off at $27.49, pushing the yield to an astounding 6.26% (I analyzed them earlier when their yield was at 6.05%).  Does ATT last?  They are making now a bigger push for android phones, which is obvious due to the "non" exclusivity of the iPhone.  I know we are all about cell phone's and wireless coverage - but AT&T still has Cable, Internet, Land Line, U-Verse etc.  - question I have is - are these products of old age and are on a decline as well?  Being in the Dow 30, AT&T has to have something.

Lorillard (LO): They have dropped, in the last month, about $8 - roughly from mid $82 to $74.65, thus pumping the yield to 6.03% (According to google finance).  They are a cigarette company, and I know some people may be upset for me writing about them, but their yield is very strong.  I may do a further evaluation in the upcoming weeks on them.

Hudson City Bancorp (HCBK): They have dropped tremendously as well to $10.98 due to low mortgage interest rates and the uncertainty of these rate fluctuations in the future.  Their yield currently stands at 5.48%.

What do all of you think of these stocks?  Any other High dividend yielders that look attractive going into the weekend?

Disclosure: I do not hold nor recommend anything. This is actual data, analysis, however I base no investor recommendation. However, I personally would add/start a position on this firm, however my direction is different from anyone else's. Thank you for your understanding.

Johnson & Johnson Analysis

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Johnson & Johnson is a member of the Dividend Aristocrat list, meaning they have paid and increased their divided for 25+ Years consecutively.  As a dividend investor - this is only phenomenal news as your cash flow stream from owning their stock has a consistency of getting yearly raises!

To start the analysis, I would like to look at their price: as of December 27th 2010 at 1:33 PM they are trading at $61.96.   Their 52 week high is $66.20, giving a 6.8% chance of appreciation on the pricing giving its most recent high.  Their low is just a tad over $56 over the prior 52 weeks.  Therefore, it is somewhere in between.  I believe with JNJ (Johnson & Johnson), price is not necessarily the most important thing as you invest for cash flow, and their cash flow always grows every year.  Basically, invest into JNJ for Cash flow, DRIP it and you will see a marvelous performance throughout the years of owning the stock.

Price to Earnings Ratio:  JNJ has a current 12.73 P/E ratio, well below the S&P average and according to Morning star it is below the 14 P/E for the industry average.  Therefore, JNJ's stock is relatively cheap to its earnings and is currently undervalued against the average of both the industry and S&P index.

Dividend Yield: My favorite part.  Their current dividend yield when trading at $61.96 is 3.49%.  I know, you may be thinking that is small and not an extremely large dividend yield, but I think it is just perfect.  You would be getting a greater payout than the current government treasury yield, which is what I always look for.  Also, as stated in the very first paragraph, JNJ has consistently paid an increasing dividend for over 25 years!!  This is the most important part, because not only are they constantly increasing their dividend every year, but their share price continually goes up, therefore keeping their dividend yield at lower levels.  In fact, their dividend yield growth rate is an astounding 14.58%!  Therefore, you get (on average) a 14.58% increase yearly to your dividend cash flow from JNJ.  How many jobs have you had that give you a 14.58 increase every year on average?

Payout Ratio:  Their dividend is $2.16 per year and their EPS is $4.87.  Therefore, 2.16/4.87 = 44.25%, a perfect payout ratio.  It falls right in between my preferred 40-60% payout ratio, showing that it keeps some earnings for growth but gives a nice portion in dividends.

Conclusion:  Johnson and Johnson is a great first stock to place in your portfolio.  They are one of the most consistent stocks giving their aristocrat status, their brand recognition and the soundness of the company.  They are a great stock to own for its cash flow as they have recorded past history of amazing returns on their stock price and once placed into a Dividend Reinvestment Plan account, you can increase your cash flow dramatically year after year.  At the given price, I would start a position in Johnson and Johnson based on their dividend growth alone.

-Lanny B.

Disclosure: I do not hold nor recommend anything.  This is actual data, analysis, however I base no investor recommendation.  However, I personally would add/start a position on this firm, however my direction is different from anyone else's.  Thank you for your understanding.