Wall Street doesn’t like to wait, with impatient investors often drawn to today’s best-performing businesses. That’s understandable to some degree, but it ignores the fact that every business will eventually face adversity. When adversity strikes, patient investors who can think long-term may find they have an edge over those who are overly short-term focused.
That’s the big picture today with United Parcel Service (UPS +0.02%) and Stanley Black & Decker (SWK +0.19%). Both of these industrial stocks are working on turnarounds and seeing early signs of success. But investors aren’t interested because financial results are still relatively weak. Here’s why, a decade from now, you may regret not buying these stocks.
Image source: Getty Images.
UPS and Stanley Black & Decker are necessity businesses
While nobody needs to send a package or buy a tool, per se, the world wouldn’t work the way it does without the products and services that UPS and Stanley Black & Decker provide. That’s the long-term underpinning that supports both of them. Of course, it also helps that both are industry giants, with well-established brands and customer relationships. Neither will be easily replaced.
From a big-picture perspective, they are both good companies. In fact, Stanley Black & Decker is a Dividend King, with over 50 years of consecutive annual dividend increases. You can’t create a record like that by accident; it requires consistent, strong execution throughout the entire business cycle. UPS went public only in 1999, so it doesn’t have the same track record. However, the dividend has generally trended higher since its IPO.
Today’s Change
(0.02%) $0.02
Current Price
$106.69
Key Data Points
Market Cap
$91B
Day’s Range
$105.39 – $107.31
52wk Range
$82.00 – $122.41
Volume
10.5M
Avg Vol
6.4M
Gross Margin
18.32%
Dividend Yield
6.15%
That said, neither of these two businesses is hitting on all cylinders today. That’s why the stocks are down materially from their recent highs, pushing UPS’ yield up to 6.4% and Stanley Black & Decker’s to 4.2%. Both are at the high end of the historical yield range for these leading industrial companies. That suggests there’s an opportunity here for investors who think long term.
The problems are slowly getting better
Both UPS and Stanley Black & Decker are in the middle of business overhauls. Each company is looking to slim down and cut costs, focusing on their most profitable businesses. They have each sold businesses, closed less productive facilities, and increased spending on technology. Stanley Black & Decker has also been heavily focused on reducing leverage after a debt-funding acquisition spree. Wall Street appears to be taking a show-me attitude in both cases.
Only the early signs of success have already started to roll in, and Wall Street isn’t taking notice. For example, UPS has seen its revenue per piece in the U.S. market increase for several consecutive quarters, despite overall revenue declines in the U.S. business. A part of the process has involved reducing the volume of packages it carries from low-margin customers like Amazon (AMZN 1.28%). So you would expect to see revenues decline even as profit margins improved. It looks like the company’s turnaround remains solidly on track.
Today’s Change
(0.19%) $0.15
Current Price
$79.42
Key Data Points
Market Cap
$12B
Day’s Range
$77.89 – $80.18
52wk Range
$61.90 – $93.37
Volume
1.4M
Avg Vol
2M
Gross Margin
29.76%
Dividend Yield
4.17%
Stanley Black & Decker, meanwhile, has seen its gross profit margin improve and its leverage fall over the last couple of years. Again, that’s exactly the goal the company is working toward, and Wall Street doesn’t seem to care because it is focused on the near-term issues around inflation and tariffs.
Get paid well to wait for investors to notice
If you buy these two high-yield industrial stocks today, you are setting yourself up to collect an attractive passive income stream. You are also getting in early on the turnarounds that are starting to take shape at UPS and Stanley Black & Decker, which means you could see capital appreciation, too. Neither stock is likely to be an immediate success story, but if you don’t buy them today, you’ll likely look back a decade from now and wish you had.
