Value-Based Management (VBM) & EVA

Collins Stewart oil and gas analyst Katherine Lucas Minyard this morning reiterated her “Buy” recommendations on several oil majors. The fundamentals of the business are improving, she writes, with West Texas Intermediate and Brent crude prices average $78 and $79 per barrel, respectively, in the second quarter, which was higher than her $75 estimate. Refining margins are up 14% from year-ago levels, she notes. And the stocks offer a fat dividend, at 4.6%, on average. The one fly in

David Hoover, current CEO of EVA company  Ball Corp (BLL) is retiring.  Hoover is famous for suggesting that he hopes to be the one to own the last share of BLL when asked about the company's aggressive share buyback and capital structure. Here's an excerpt from a recent article about his tenure at BLL and how his successor, John Hayes, will stay the course:

Sears Holdings' Eddie Lampert's  Letter/March 15, 2006 Success must include profitable growth. As a team, we are aligned around the goal of increasing our EBITDA. We are not focused on sales or sales growth as an end in itself. Nor will we spend capital on stores simply because we have the capital available to invest or because everyone else does it. Rather, we are investing in our stores where

The best tools on the web to help us identify strong economic performance plus low valuations are at AFGView.com. We have been using the tools for almost 8 years and they have been the core of our ValueAligned® Investing Process - where we own stocks of great companies to make sure our clients have enough income to maintain their dignity and independence in retirement.  Here's an analysis from their website on the relative attractiveness

When I render advice to my clients concerning how much money they ought to have in stocks, I always remember something that Ken Fisher wrote in his book The Only Three Questions That Count: Investing by Knowing What Others Don't . The questionnaires, the "investor-type characterizations" and the colored charts in your customized plan aren't for you.  They're for the salesperson and the brokerage firm.  The elaborate plan that tells you how unique you are and how much of your savings should

Against the developed nations' major currencies, the U.S. dollar is near record lows. But against all currencies, including the developing world, the dollar is still up over 300% since 1980! Many pundits forget that in the late 1990's Rubin and Greenspan - the smarty pants guys they are - saved the governments of

David L. Berkowitz Portfolio Manager & Advisor VALUE ALIGNED PORTFOLIO THIRD QUARTER 2010 Dear Friend, For the 3rd quarter, the S&P Total Return Index ended up +11.3%.  The ValueAligned Folio was up

Stock Market ThoughtsThe S&P 500 fell 11% in the quarter, despite the continuing recovery in corporate earnings. The S&P now stands at about 11 times next year’s $93 consensus estimate of net income from operations, and it yields 2.2%. At the Morningstar conference last month, I kept telling skeptical attendees that I was bullish because it is so rare to be able to buy the S&P at three-quarters of its long-term average P/E and with a yield