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John Dorfman Columns category, Page 4

Pope Francis, first Latin American pontiff, dies at 88
John Dorfman: Winners, losers reveal market’s flavor this year
You can understand a lot about this year’s stock market by looking at the winners and losers among the nation’s biggest stocks. Among the 167 stocks with a market value of $100 billion or more, the best performers this year are: • Nvidia Corp. (NVDA), up 83%. • Meta Platforms...
John Dorfman: Nasdaq leaps back to the forefront
Like a race-car driver slicing in front of the competition, the Nasdaq Stock Market has resumed market leadership in 2023. This year through March 17, the Nasdaq Composite Index has returned 11.1%. The New York Stock Exchange Composite Index has fallen 3.8%. The most widely watched market gauge, the Standard...
Two insiders buy shares at Devon Energy
The CEO of Devon Energy (DVN), Richard Muncrief, made two purchases of his own company’s stock in February. That’s intriguing, because the price of oil and natural gas have been falling lately. Shares of Devon, the 18th-largest U.S. energy company by market value, are down more than 18% in the...
John Dorfman: DEFT contest winners predict recession
“Think of the economy as a big exuberant dog that jumps up on people,” my father said to me long ago, “and think of the Fed as a man with a rolled up newspaper.” The man taps the dog lightly to get it to stop jumping, but that has no...
Moderna, Cirrus Logic are Balance Sheet Powerhouses
On a hilltop in your town live two people. Joseph has an income of $400,000 a year but little savings. Francois has income of only $90,000 a year but $30 million in the bank. Who would you rather be? Any sane person would pick Francois. And yet, when they go...
John Dorfman: PulteGroup and Group 1 Automotive show value, momentum
Just because a stock is cheap doesn’t mean it can’t get cheaper. That’s why some investors prefer stocks that show both value and momentum. Twice a year, I highlight a few such stocks in this column. Here are a few more. Each of these stocks has beaten the S&P 500...
John Dorfman: Don’t be a stranger to non-U.S. stocks
Most economists predict a recession for the U.S. in 2023. No one is good at foretelling the future, but the recession threat may be one reason to consider adding some non-U.S. stocks to your portfolio. Here are five foreign stocks I currently like. All of them trade in the U.S.,...
John Dorfman: Market following classic January playbook, so far
So far this year, the stock market is doing exactly what market lore says it should. According to tradition, four things are true about January: • The market is likely to rise. • Small stocks will excel. • Last year’s losers will rebound. • As January goes, so will go...
John Dorfman: Mosaic, Resideo new to Casualty List
Get ’em while they’re down. Buying stocks on bad news that is real but temporary is a time-honored technique, used in the past by investment masters such as Jonathan Neff and Sir John Templeton. It’s the idea behind my quarterly Casualty List, containing stocks that have been knocked down in...
Dorfman: Amazon and other analysts’ favorite stocks face-planted in 2022
When 2022 began, Amazon.com Inc. (AMZN) was Wall Street analysts’ favorite stock. Thirty-one analysts said to buy it, with nary a “hold” or “sell” to be heard. The stock fell nearly 50% last year. This is not an anomaly. The other stocks the analytical corps adored when the year began...
John Dorfman: Robot Portfolio chugs on, up 915% in 24 years
Give that Robot some new polish! The Robot Portfolio is a hypothetical collection of 10 stocks I have compiled each year beginning in 1999. In 24 years, it has achieved a cumulative 915% return, compared with 373% for the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index. The 10 stocks are picked by...
John Dorfman: Sifting through the ashes of 2022’s biggest disasters
Coinbase Global Inc. leads this year’s list of stock-market disasters. Here are the stocks down the most through Dec. 16, among all stocks with a market value of $5 billion or more. • Coinbase Global Inc. (COIN) 85.5% • Snap Inc. (SNAP) 82% • Twilio Inc. (TWLO) 81.8% • Lucid...
John Dorfman: Bunny Portfolio has averaged 13.6% per year
What do you call a stock that has a great earnings-growth history yet sells for modest price? You might call it a paradox. I call it a candidate for the Bunny Portfolio. I invented the Bunny Portfolio in 1999 and have written about it almost every year since. It’s named...
John Dorfman: Executives buy at Align Technology, Black Stone Minerals
Company executives usually talk an optimistic game. When they put their money where their mouth is, that’s when I pay attention. Align Technology Joseph Hogan, president and chief executive officer of Align Technology Inc. (ALGN), spent about $2 million to buy his own company’s stock in November. Hogan had sold...
John Dorfman: Capital One, Kelly Services selling below book value
People can argue all day about whether book value is a good gauge of a stock’s value. I say it is, and I believe the results from this column tend to prove it. Book value is a company’s net worth – the sum of its assets minus its liabilities. It...
John Dorfman: What’s a fun-sized stock? Around $1 billion
A company with a market value of about $1 billion is small enough to grow fast, yet large enough so that it can begin to appeal to institutional investors such as pension funds. I define large-capitalization stocks as those with a market value of $10 billion or more, mid-capitalization stocks...
John Dorfman: Stealing from the best: Here is my purloined portfolio
A politician would be silly not to do opposition research. A baseball team would be goofy not to use scouting reports. By the same token, an investment manager would have to be singularly incurious not to check out what other managers are buying and selling. Once a year in this...
John Dorfman: Pioneer Natural and Alico boast dividend appeal
A time-honored investing method is to buy stocks that have rising dividends. In my opinion, it’s a sensible method. A dividend increase acts as a sincerity barometer, showing that management believes earnings progress is sustainable. Right now, with a bear market raging, I think it is especially sensible, since dividend-paying...
John Dorfman: After third-quarter carnage, look at the Casualty List
Investors suffered their third unpleasant quarter in a row in the quarter that just ended. After this pounding, quite a few stocks look attractive to me. I’ve highlighted a few of them on my Casualty List. This list, which I compile each quarter, contains stocks that have been smacked down...
John Dorfman: My buy-sell ratings on 20 largest stocks
The largest stocks dominate the headlines — and investors’ wallets. So even though I’m fond of off-the-beaten-path stocks, once a year I give my buy-or-avoid ratings on the 20 largest stocks. Today’s the day. • Apple Inc. (AAPL, $2.4 trillion market value). Buy. The company’s iPhones and Mac computers have...
John Dorfman: Short-selling contest has repeat winner
Laurent Condon, a professional trader in France, won my Short Sellers Don’t Have Horns short-selling contest — his second triumph in the annual competition. Condon won the contest in 2017-2018 and finished third the following year. He also has excelled in some of my other contests. In addition to the...
John Dorfman: Insiders have been buying at Intel, Fox
In the past few weeks, insiders have been buying their own shares at Intel Corp. (INTC) and Fox Corp. (FOX). Patrick Gelsinger, the chief executive officer at Intel, spent just over half a million dollars to buy shares in August, bringing his stake to a bit more than $7 million....
John Dorfman: As the Fed tightens, what stocks may do well
He wasn’t kidding. Jerome Powell, chairman of the Federal Reserve Board, said Friday that the Fed’s Open Markets Committee will “use our tools forcefully,” and keep raising interest rates until inflation comes down. This is “no place to stop or pause,” he said. Investors winced, and stocks tumbled. The so-called...
John Dorfman: Occidental Petroleum, U.S. Steel look good on cash flow
Suppose you run a successful food-delivery business. Two years ago, you spent $1 million on a fleet of a dozen new trucks. On your books and tax records this year, you will subtract $200,000 from your earnings (profits) reflecting depreciation on those trucks. But you aren’t actually laying out any...
John Dorfman: What stocks would value saint Ben Graham like today?
Value investors speak in reverential tones about Benjamin Graham. A hedge-fund manager, Columbia University professor and author, Graham (1884-1976) is widely considered the father of value investing. Once a year, I attempt to guess what stocks the maestro would buy if he were alive today. Graham Method I use a...


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