Ken Fisher's First Quarter Top Increases and Decreases

As of the first quarter 2013, Ken Fisher held 474 stocks valued at over $37.628 billion. The following companies represent his top increases and decreases in holdings.

1. BP PLC ( BP )

Fisher made the largest increase in BP during the last quarter. He increased his holdings by 28478.2%, adding a total of 1,463,782 shares. He purchased these shares at an average price of $42.49 per share. Since this purchase the price per share has increased 3% from the average purchase price.

Fisher holds on to 1,463,782 shares of BP, representing 0.17% of his total portfolio.

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BP provides fuel for transportation, energy for heat and light, lubricants to keep engines moving and the petrochemical products used to make everyday items like plastic bottles. It operates through two business segments: Exploration and Production as well as Refining and Marketing.

BP has a market cap of $139.18 billion; its shares were traded at around $43.59 with a P/E ratio of 6.20 and P/S ratio of 0.40. The dividend yield of BP stocks is 4.80%.

2. Citigroup ( C )

Fisher increased his holdings in Citigroup 5025.84% during the first quarter. He bought 372,465 shares at an average price of $43.48 per share. Since this purchase the price per share has increased 20.1% from the average purchase price. Fisher now owns 379,876 shares of Citigroup, making up 0.045% of his total portfolio.

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Citigroup is a global financial services holding company, whose businesses provide consumers, corporations, governments and institutions with a range of financial products and services, including consumer banking, credit cards, corporate and investment banking, securities brokerage and wealth management. Citigroup has more than 200 million customer accounts and does business in more than 160 countries.

Citigroup has a market cap of $158.47 billion; its shares were traded at around $52.07 with a P/E ratio of 18.40 and P/S ratio of 2.20. The dividend yield of Citigroup stocks is 0.10%.

3. Bank of America ( BAC )

Fisher bought 1,398,080 shares of Bank of America during the first quarter. This represents a 4846.54% increase in his holdings on the company. The shares traded at an average $11.84 per share. Since Fisher's buy, the price per share has increased 13.9% from the average purchase price.

Fisher now holds on to 1,426,927 shares of Bank of America, representing 0.046% of his total portfolio.

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Bank of America, through its banking and various non-banking subsidiaries throughout the U.S, provides a diversified range of banking and non-banking financial services and products through six business segments: Deposits, Card Services, Consumer Real Estate Services, Global Commercial Banking, Global Banking & Markets and Investment Management.

Bank of America has a market cap of $144.99 billion; its shares were traded at around $13.48 with a P/E ratio of 41.70 and a P/S ratio of 1.70. The dividend yield of Bank of America stocks is 0.30%.

4. Petroleo Brasileiro SA Petrobras ( PBR )

During the first quarter, Fisher dumped 12,535,029 shares of Petroleo Brasileiro stock, representing a -98.71% decrease in his holdings on the company. He sold these shares for an average price of $17.52 per share. Since his sell the price per share has increased 2.3% from his average sell price.

Fisher still holds 163,261 shares, representing 0.0072% of his total portfolio.

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Petroleo Brasileiro was formed to conduct the Brazilian government's hydrocarbon activities. It began operations in 1954 and for approximately forty years carried out crude oil and natural gas production and refining activities in Brazil on behalf of the government. It is an integrated oil and gas company in Brazil and in Latin America who is the supplier of crude oil and oil products.

Petroleo Brasileiro has a market cap of $116.11 billion; its shares were traded at around $17.89 with a P/E ratio of 12.20 and a P/S ratio of 0.80. The company had an annual average earnings growth of 10.5% over the past ten years.

5. Abbott Laboratories ( ABT )

Fisher decreased his holdings in Abbott Laboratories by -95.16% in the most recent quarter. He sold 226,811 shares for an average price of $33.88 per share. Since his sell the price per share has increased 11.3%.

Ken Fisher still holds 11,528 shares of Abbott Laboratories, representing a very small 0.0011% of his total portfolio.

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Abbott Laboratories' main business is the discovery, development, manufacture and sale of a broad and diversified line of health care products. Abbott has five reportable revenue segments: Proprietary Pharmaceutical Products, Established Pharmaceutical Products, Diagnostic Products, Nutritional Products and Vascular Products.

Abbott Laboratories has a market cap of $58.33 billion; its shares were traded at around $37.70 with a P/E ratio of 11.30 and P/S ratio of 1.50. The company had an annual average earnings growth of 10.3% over the past ten years. GuruFocus rated Abbott Laboratories the business predictability rank of 3.5-stars. The dividend of Abbott Laboratories stocks is 3.50%.

 

Source: GuruFocus

Ken Fisher interview for Forbes

With fiscal cliff fears hitting a fevered pitch, I had the chance recently to sit down with Ken Fisher and query him on his views of this widespread investor concern.

Q: Will there be a fiscal cliff deal by yearend?
A: Can’t say. I can’t see into Mr. Boehner’s or Mr. Obama’s overtly political hearts or minds and don’t want to. But if there’s no deal, it’s not a crisis. The fiscal cliff is fake. A political invention, arbitrarily put at January 1 because it was politically expedient in 2010 to stick it there. Now it’s politically expedient to push it past the 2014 elections. Democrats have more to lose in 2014 than is commonly perceived now and they’ll want to compromise.

Q: Is time running out?
A: No! The fiscal cliff which is really more of a fiscal rolling plain has many moving parts that don’t hit all at once. Spending cuts are already underway and will happen piecemeal, allegedly, over the year. The higher taxes, many of them, aren’t due until April of 2014. Maybe this impacts withholding levels if a deal is struck later—folks have to adjust them then adjust back.
What could happen is Mr. Boehner and Mr. Obama say, “Now we declare we have until February 28 to solve this issue.” They did the exact thing before with the payroll tax—arbitrarily moving the arbitrary deadline to buy time for a longer arbitrary can-kick. This is political. It’s fake. They made the rules, they can and will change them.

Q: If there’s no deal, how do you think government spending cuts impact investors?
A: People make two errors here. First, they think growing government spending is critical to a healthy economy. Wrong. Falling government spending detracts from headline GDP numbers, but GDP doesn’t perfectly reflect economic health. The private economy has been doing very well since 2009—better than most realize. Profits are near all-time high. Business spending is robust. Consumer spending is past the pre-recession peak. Incomes are growing. It’s true unemployment remains high, which no one wants. But unemployment lags economic growth, always. That started sometime before the first recession Christ lived through.
The second error is they don’t bother checking data themselves. Total government spending actually dropped a hair in 2012, and nothing terrible happened. GDP wasn’t rip-roaring, but reaccelerated mid-year. It was fine. In 2013, if you believe the plans, with the “cliff” government spending actually drops less than it did in 2012 if nothing changes. Starting in 2014 and forever after, government spending grows as it always does. From a spending standpoint, we already went off the fiscal molehill and it was fine. Not Armageddon.

Q: If current tax rates rise, what’s the market impact?
A: This is a case where the fear of the thing is so much bigger than the thing, it can’t be anything but bullish.
In the long history of income taxes in the US and overseas, there have been a great many rate jiggers. Same is true on capital gains taxes and every other form of tax imaginable. People simply do not want to believe this, because it goes against something that seems commonsensical. But there’s no clear pattern—zero—that when tax rates rise, stocks do badly (or well). Or if taxes get cut, stocks must do great. What’s clear to me from studying this is, whether you raise taxes or cut them, stocks want to rise much more than fall and will do what they were going to do anyway.
But to believe tax rates have a big darn impact on market direction you have to ignore the many, many other more important things simultaneously acting on stocks. And you have to ignore the 77% of non-US global GDP. I don’t like higher taxes because I think the government is a stupid spender of money. But I don’t fear the capital markets impact from a marginal shift in tax rates in a single country.

Q: So how is that bullish?
A: When I see big fear of potential tax hikes like now, I know that’s bullish. First, either the tax hikes don’t happen, or they’re not as bad as feared. Anyone can see how if a feared tax hike doesn’t happen, that’s a positive factor. But even if tax hikes happen as feared, vast history tells me it doesn’t have to have the big bad impact folks fear. And fear of a false factor is always bullish.

Spurce: Forbes

Kenneth Fisher’s 3 top stock picks for Q3

Ken Fisher is a businessman, chairman and also Fisher Investment’s CEO, which is a firm placed in California. Kenneth Fisher writes in the column “Portfolio Strategy” in Forbes magazine. Furthermore, he is one of the wealthiest Americans and a part of Forbes’400 world billionaires. The funds which are run by himself at Fisher Asset Management had value at 34.91 bn dollars. The three best yielding dividend stock picks of Fisher are GlaxoSmithKline, Pfizer and General Electric.

The market capitalization of GlaxoSmithKline is 107.56 bn dollars and it is currently employing around 98 thousand people, it generates revenue of around 44.150 m dollars and it also has a net income of 8.798 bn dollars. Its EBITDA and its earnings before interest amounts to 14.844 bn dollars. 33.62 is the percentage of the EBITDA margin. 36.27 of the company’s assets is the percentage representing the total debt. Because of the current financial situation, there was a realization of 62.18 per cent return on equity. The P/E ratio of GlaxoSmithKline is 13.66, its P/E ratio is 2.42, and its P/B ratio is 8.48. Its beta ratio has a value of 0.65 and the dividend yield is 5.31 per cent.

The second best yielding dividend stock pick of Ken Fisher is Pfizer with a 184. 65 bn dollars market capitalization. Furthermore, it currently employs 103,7k people, it generates revenue of 67.425 bn dollars and its net income is 8.739 billion dollars. Its EBITDA and its earnings before interest have the amount of 23.011 bn dollars. Its EBITDA margin is 34.13 per cent. 20.72 of the company’s assets is the percentage representing the total debt and the total debt concerning the equity is 47.39 per cent. Moreover, the return on equity was 10.24 per cent. The company’s P/E ratio is 20.03, its P/S ratio is 2.74 and its P/B ratio is 2.31. Its dividend yield is 3.83 per cent and its beta ratio’s value is 0.70.

The third top dividend stock pick of Fisher is General Electric, a company having 218.32 bn dollars market capitalization and currently employs 301k people. It generates revenue of 147.300 bn dollars and its net income is 14.366 billion dollars. Its EBITDA and earnings before interest amount for 31.015 bn dollars. The EBITDA margin is 21.06 per cent. The total debt represents 63.22 per cent of the company’s assets. 389.43 is the percentage which corresponds to the total debt in relation to equity. Its return on equity was 11.06 per cent. General Electric’s P/E ratio is 15.45, its P/S ratio is 1.48 and its P/B ratio is 1.89. Its dividend yield is 3.65 per cent and its beta ratio’s value is 1.61.