Selected Dividends and Earnings for August 9, 2009 to August 15, 2009

Monday, August 10, 2009

Dividends

• Entergy (ETR) - $0.750 payable 1-Sep
• Fortune Brands (FO) - $0.190 payable 1-Sep
• United States Steel Corp. (X) - $0.050 payable 10-Sep
• Valero Energy Corp. (VLO) - $0.150 payable 16-Sep
• Zions Bancorp (ZION) - $0.010 payable 26-Aug

Earnings

• Dynegy Inc. (DYN) before market open
• Fluor Corporation (FLR) after market close
• Nautilus, Inc. (NLS)
• Rackspace Hosting, Inc. (RAX) after market close
• SYSCO Corporation (SYY)

Tuesday, August 11, 2009

Dividends

• Applied Materials (AMAT) - $0.060 payable 3-Sep
• ExxonMobil Corporation (XOM) - $0.420 payable 10-Sep
• The TJX Companies, Inc. (TJX) - $0.120 payable 3-Sep
• Wyeth (WYE) - $0.300 payable 1-Sep

Earnings

• Applied Materials (AMAT)
• Warnaco Group, Inc. (WRC) after market close

Wednesday, August 12, 2009

Dividends

• AK Steel Holding Corp (AKS) - $0.050 payable 10-Sep
• CenterPoint Energy (CNP) - $0.190 payable 10-Sep
• Charles Schwab (SCHW) - $0.060 payable 28-Aug
• Costco Wholesale Corporation (COST) - $0.180 payable 28-Aug
• Duke Energy Corporation (DUK) - $0.240 payable 16-Sep
• DuPont (DD) - $0.410 payable 11-Sep
• Eli Lilly (LLY) - $0.490 payable 10-Sep
• Emerson Electric (EMR) - $0.330 payable 10-Sep
• Exelon Corporation (EXC) - $0.525 payable 10-Sep
• Jones Apparel Group Inc. (JNY) - $0.050 payable 28-Aug
• Linear Technology (LLTC) - $0.220 payable 26-Aug
• Otter Tail Power (OTTR) - $0.298 payable 10-Sep
• Pitney Bowes Inc. (PBI) - $0.360 payable 12-Sep
• Plum Creek Timber (PCL) - $0.420 payable 31-Aug
• ProLogis (PLD) - $0.150 payable 31-Aug
• Spectra Energy (SE) - $0.250 payable 14-Sep
• TECO Energy Inc. (TE) - $0.200 payable 28-Aug
• The Kroger Co. (KR) - $0.090 payable 1-Sep
• Wal-Mart Stores Inc. (WMT) - $0.273 payable 8-Sep

Earnings

• Liz Claiborne Inc. (LIZ) before market open
• Macy's, Inc. (M)
• MAIDENFORM BRANDS INC (MFB) before market open
• Sara Lee (SLE)
• The Progressive Corporation (PGR)
• U.S. Home Systems (USHS) after market close

Thursday, August 13, 2009

Dividends

• Allergan (AGN) - $0.050 payable 7-Sep
• Avon Products Inc. (AVP) - $0.210 payable 1-Sep
• International Paper Co. (IP) - $0.025 payable 15-Sep
• Jabil Circuit, Inc. (JBL) - $0.070 payable 1-Sep
• KLA-Tencor (KLAC) - $0.150 payable 1-Sep
• L-3 Communications Holdings, Inc. (LLL) - $0.350 payable 15-Sep
• Murphy Oil Corporation (MUR) - $0.250 payable 1-Sep
• Rockwell Automation (ROK) - $0.290 payable 10-Sep
• Rockwell Collins, Inc. (COL) - $0.240 payable 8-Sep
• Simon Property Group, Inc. (SPG) - $0.600 payable 18-Sep
• Snap-on Incorporated (SNA) - $0.300 payable 8-Sep

Earnings

• Autodesk, Inc. (ADSK)
• Kohls Corporation (KSS)
• Nordstrom (JWN) after market close
• The Estée Lauder Companies Inc. (EL) before market open
• Wal-Mart Stores Inc. (WMT)

Friday, August 14, 2009

Dividends

• Bemis Company, Inc. (BMS) - $0.225 payable 1-Sep
• Ingersoll-Rand Co. Ltd. (IR) - $0.070 payable 1-Sep
• PACCAR (PCAR) - $0.090 payable 8-Sep

Earnings

• Abercrombie & Fitch Co. (ANF) before market open
• JCPenney (JCP) before market open

Underlined tickers are those that are particularly interesting for me; they may be on my watch list or I may have open positions (i.e. likely naked put options or the underlying).

Selected Dividends and Earnings for November 16, 2008 to November 22, 2008

Monday, November 17, 2008

Dividends

• Aflac Incorporated (AFL) - $0.240 payable 1-Dec
• Marathon Oil Corporation (MRO) - $0.240 payable 10-Dec

Earnings

• Covidien Ltd. (COV)
• Lowe's Companies (LOW) before market open
• Target Corporation (TGT) before market open

Tuesday, November 18, 2008

Dividends

• Archer Daniels Midland Company (ADM) - $0.130 payable 11-Dec
• Honeywell (HON) - $0.275 payable 10-Dec
• Microsoft (MSFT) - $0.130 payable 11-Dec
• Moody's Corporation (MCO) - $0.100 payable 10-Dec
• Parker Hannifin Corp. (PH) - $0.250 payable 5-Dec
• Target Corporation (TGT) - $0.160 payable 10-Dec

Earnings

• Home Depot Inc (HD)
• Medtronic Inc. (MDT) before market open

Wednesday, November 19, 2008

Dividends

• 3M Company (MMM) - $0.500 payable 12-Dec
• Avon Products Inc. (AVP) - $0.200 payable 1-Dec
• Carnival Corporation & Carnival plc (CCL) - $0.400 payable 12-Dec
• Cummins Inc. (CMI) - $0.175 payable 1-Dec
• Liz Claiborne (LIZ) - $0.056 payable 15-Dec
• Pitney Bowes Inc. (PBI) - $0.350 payable 12-Dec
• Questar Corp. (STR) - $0.125 payable 15-Dec

Earnings

• Intuit (INTU) after market close

Thursday, November 20, 2008

Dividends

• AmeriSourceBergen (ABC) - $0.100 payable 8-Dec
• Assurant, Inc. (AIZ) - $0.140 payable 10-Dec
• Equifax Inc. (EFX) - $0.040 payable 15-Dec
• KLA-Tencor (KLAC) - $0.150 payable 1-Dec
• Prudential Financial, Inc. (PRU) - $0.580 payable 19-Dec

Earnings

• Autodesk, Inc. (ADSK) after market close
• Dell, Inc. (DELL) after market close
• Gamestop Corp. (GME) before market open
• Gap Inc. (GPS) after market close
• Limited Brands (LTD)
• Patterson Dental (PDCO) before market open
• Salesforce.com, Inc. (CRM) after market close

Friday, November 21, 2008

Dividends

• Johnson & Johnson (JNJ) - $0.460 payable 9-Dec
• Robert Half International (RHI) - $0.110 payable 15-Dec
• The Hershey Company (HSY) - $0.298 payable 15-Dec
• The McGraw Hill Companies (MHP) - $0.220 payable 10-Dec

Earnings

• H.J. Heinz Company (HNZ)

Underlined tickers are those that are particularly interesting for me; they may be on my watch list or I may have open positions (i.e. likely naked put options or the underlying).

This liquidity injection is a bailout.

A 200 billion dollar liquidity injection was announced today. The Fed and other central banks are essentially willing to lend on mortgage backed securities (MBS). This includes agency backed (the stuff Annaly / NLY, holds) and AAA private label (the stuff Thornburg / TMA, holds). While NLY, TMA, and the like cannot directly borrow from the window, companies like Bear Sterns (BSC) can.

This is the capitalist version of nationalizing MBS. The Fed is essentially willing to be a buyer of last resort for these securities for a discount.

The market reacted with an incredibly strong rally. I am guessing it is a combination of short covering, bouncing of January support, and this bailout.

Leverage works both ways and this 3-4% across the board gain is a gift. While I believe the rally has legs, I took the opportunity to unload a bunch of positions into the rally. I need to de-leverage my portfolio and I am not going to give up such a chance. I closed my front month Mar 33.50 ADSK puts, Apr 33 GE puts, and Apr 35 WAG puts. Nothing wrong with those companies per se. Closed ADSK and WAG for the margin. Closed GE because it broke its long term 33 support and there might be a chance to grab it lower.

Given that there is P/E compression across the board, I am revising the price at which I am willing to take assignment of stock lower. So as a risk management move, I am closing many puts that have too little reward for the risk taken. Fading the rally, so to speak.

The 14% gain in Wachovia (WB) was great since that is the stock that is causing me margin calls. My strategy right now is to recover margin and stay in the game until March options expiration. Then I am going to sell some calls against the WB that I will likely be assigned.

Opportunity in Wachovia (WB) in market whipsaw?

On Friday, the markets was just plain ugly. A look at the advancers vs. decliners for all the major averages will tell you that almost everything was down.

In particular, I am options with intrinsic leverage on underlying securities with a high beta in sectors leading the market decline (consumer discretionary). So, my leverage vs. the market on a down day like this is somewhere between 3x and 4x. That's a 10% drop in one day.

I went through a did a through check of all my portfolio positions and I think I will be ok if I can make it through possible margin calls. I have a couple of positions (ADSK, NVDA, EMC) that were written at the money for the front month and are now in the money and at risk for assignment. I have enough cash and margin to take the assignment. I am more concerned about the overall margin. Since TD Ameritrade does not use portfolio margin, margin is often a concern for my style (which has high drawdowns). We'll see what happens next week. I might have to close some of my longer term puts (which are currently making money) for some buying power.

I spent most of Friday listening to conference calls (there's no reason to listen to CNBC on a day like that; it just makes you more emotional) but I did manage a few trades. With a review of the last Wachovia (WB) quarter, I am still convinced that they will be fine in the long run. I am not saying this is a bottom. I fully expect more writedowns. In the conference call, WB management gave the impression that they are properly reserved for a 60 basis point loss (triple their normal rate) on their Pick-a-Pay (what WB calls Option ARM) loan portfolio. However, looking at recent data and the 'vintage' charts, there is a good chance that losses will soon be estimated at 80 bps or higher. In addition, the auto portfolio looks pretty bad too but that's reasonably small. There is also the risk of canceling the dividend. They don't need to right now but it is an easy source of additional capital. Either of those things might pressure the shares. However, I think the risks are priced in for long term buyers. So I sold a bunch of WB naked puts for multiple months out and at various strikes. This should more than double my WB delta.

I also closed out my XHB naked calls. I am not going to be greedy so I took the 60% gain in two days.

We'll see what happens Monday. If we get additional downside, I am going get more defensive and close out everything that I don't need for additional buying power and then start adding more delta to all my conviction buys (to steal a Goldman Sachs term).

Missed Foster Wheeler (FWLT) again, caught Autodesk (ADSK)

Sold front month Autodesk (ADSK) Mar 22.5 puts after the earning disappointment.

Foster Wheeler (FWLT) down on further 'capitulation' type weakness (from Cramerica?). Tried to sell Apr 60 puts for 3.00, but didn't work. Will keep trying.

Gainskeeper working now in TD Ameritrade Izone. Spent all day playing with it. It gives a great view of how my trades have been going. It is not just for taxes; it is great for fine tuning trading strategy.

Cadence (CDNS) - Decision making in the face of uncertainty

Today was one of those days that I hate. Everything is up and by a lot. As an options trader who makes money from selling time premium, this isn't my thing. Sure, I make money since I am generally positive delta and negative vega. (I will probably explain all the option greeks sometime -- mostly to help myself gather my thoughts learn them better. I mostly only use delta and I am trying to learn to use vega.) However, I write options expecting them to expire. So a market rally just helps to speed up that process a little bit. However, I ran out of margin a while back during the big dip and thus do not have many open positions for March. If the market is up, then it is hard for me to find a good risk/reward balance in options to write since I am mostly selling puts naked. So the ideal market is one that is perfectly flat (historical volatility of zero) while having a high implied volatility. That's what I dream about. Of course, the markets aren't so nice.

So I was looking for options to sell and noticed that CDNS (Cadence Design Systems) was down 33% to 10 a share. Cadence makes CAD (computer aided design) software for the electronics industry (some people call it EDA -- Electronic Design Automation). CDNS is to semiconductors as ADSK (Autodesk) is to buildings. Brought up a maximum length chart on Yahoo finance and saw:



CDNS is basically back to 1996 levels. Always a good sign. I like things that are at long term lows (that's my style of investing most days).

Took a look at the AP bulletin which was pretty useless. I am convinced that they are written by robots (or people playing robots). It calls CDNS a "semiconductor manufacturing equipment maker". Never a good sign.

Basically 4Q '07 was ok but guidance for 2008 is bad. 1Q is going to be a loss and full year guidance is down to non-GAAP EPS of $1.11 to $1.19 (GAAP EPS tends to be lower since EDA companies take write-offs for their acquisitions). The current Street consensus estimate $1.53 a share. With earnings potentially down over 28%, the price drop seems reasonable, right?

I disagree. I think the bad new was already mostly priced in. I am more than happy to go long this company at P/E of 10 (after lowered guidance, even better!). I sold a bunch of Mar 10 puts at 0.85 which would give me a basis of 9.15 if assigned. Otherwise, I get about an 8% return on maximum risk or a 50% return on initial margin (for 50 or so days).

I also feel good about the fact that 53 million traded out of 268 million outstanding. Combine that kind of volume with the flat intraday price action, it smells of major buying. There was a floor around 10 all day and a volume spike and the end of the day. We might see an SEC filing some time soon.

We'll see what happens. It could prove really dumb to try to catch this falling knife. Sometimes, there is no time for analysis, and it's mostly gambling with an estimate of the odds.