It’s not the most high-profile or best followed report from the U.S. Energy Information Administration, but if you’re looking to see where in the energy sector to put your dollars, the monthly Drilling Productivity Report is a good place to start. That’s because the report projects the trends in production per well in U.S. oil shale geologies and the growth in the number of working wells.
2017 was a tough year for benchmarking my Dividend Portfolio. For the year the total price appreciation on the stocks in the portfolio was 3.4% The 21.64% return on the Standard & Poor’s 500 crushed that. The dividend yield on the portfolio for the year came to 3.11%. Which beat the 2.8% total return from holding 10-year Treasury bonds for 2017. The total return on my Dividend Portfolio for 2017 was 6.48%.
On Friday oil futures hit a 29-month high. That took West Texas Intermediate to a gain of 8.5% in 2017 to date. However, energy stocks in the Standard & Poor’s 500 are off 9.8% when the S&P 500 itself is up more than 16% for 2017. Energy stocks normally go up when the price of oil rises Sp how do we explain the decline in energy shares at the same time as oil prices are rising?
Norges Bank Investment Management, the entity that runs Norway’s $1 trillion sovereign wealth fund, has recommended that the fund, which invests the country’s take from oil and gas revenue from production from its own reserves, sell off its shares in oil and gas stocks. The fund owns $35 billion in oil and gas shares. Should you follow suit?
Johnson Controls, a member of my long-term 50 Stocks portfolio, hasn’t done much of anything for a year now. Over the last 12 months the shares are up just 0.66%. That performance isn’t surprising. The company just about completely remade itself in 2016 by spinning off its automotive interiors business and by merger with Ireland-based Tyco International in what has been called one of the most egregious examples of corporate tax avoidance since Constantine outsourced the Roman Empire to Byzantium. Frankly I don’t think investors have known what to do with the “new” company–and the bad taste left by the 2016 tax inversion ploy and the company’s continued problems in generating cash have given investors very few reasons to put in the homework necessary to figure it out. But I think Johnson Controls deserves a little bit of attention now
Last week, the Standard & Poor’s 500 went just about no where. We started the week at 2549 on the S&P 500 (that was the October 6 close) and ended at 2553 at the close on October 13. Check my math but that’s 4 points on the week for an index at 2550. That qualifies as massive sideways. Which can be a good thing.
