price to sales ratio

CONAGRA FOODS INC. $39 (New York symbol CAG; Income Portfolio, Consumer sector; Shares outstanding: 427.1 million; Market cap: $16.7 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 0.9; Dividend yield: 2.6%; TSINetwork Rating: Above Average; www.conagrafoods .com) makes packaged foods, including Chef Boyardee canned pasta, Hunt’s tomato sauce, Peter Pan peanut butter, Orville Redenbacher popcorn and Reddiwip whipped cream.

Consumers supply 70% of ConAgra’s sales. Businesses, including restaurants and other food makers, provide the remaining 30%.

In January 2013, the company bought Ralcorp Holdings, the largest private-label food maker in the U.S., for $4.75 billion.

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GENERAL MILLS INC. $56 (New York symbol GIS, Conservative Growth Portfolio, Consumer sector; Shares outstanding: 596.1 million; Market cap: $33.4 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 1.9; Dividend yield: 3.1%; TSINetwork Rating: Above Average; www.generalmills.com) is one of the world’s largest food makers. Its top brands include Big G (cereal), Green Giant (canned and frozen vegetables), Pillsbury (baking dough), Old El Paso (tacos), Progresso (soups and salads) and Yoplait (yogourt).

In its fiscal 2015 third quarter, which ended February 22, 2015, General Mills earned $343.2 million, down 16.4% from $410.6 million a year earlier. Earnings per share declined 12.5%, to $0.56 from $0.64, on fewer shares outstanding.

Without unusual items, such as gains and losses on hedging contracts General Mills uses to lock in certain ingredient prices, earnings per share gained 12.9%, to $0.70 from $0.62.

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MONDELEZ INTERNATIONAL INC. $40 (Nasdaq symbol MDLZ; Conservative Growth Portfolio, Consumer sector; Shares outstanding: 1.6 billion; Market cap: $64.0 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 2.0; Dividend yield: 1.5%; TSINetwork Rating: Above Average; www.mondelezinternational.com) makes cookies and biscuits (Oreo, Chips Ahoy, Ritz), chocolate bars (Cadbury, Toblerone) and gum and candy (Trident, Chiclets and Halls cough drops).

In May 2014, the company agreed to merge its packaged coffee business with European coffee maker D.E. Master Blenders. Under the deal, Mondelez will contribute its coffee brands, including Jacobs, Gevalia and Tassimo, to a new firm called Jacobs Douwe Egberts. It will get about $4.5 billion in cash and 49% of the new company in return.

Mondelez aims to close the deal by the end of 2015. It will use the cash to buy back shares and pay down its $12.8-billion long-term debt, or 20% of its market cap.

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WAL-MART STORES INC. $75 (New York symbol WMT; Conservative Growth Portfolio: Consumer sector; Shares outstanding: 3.2 billion; Market cap: $240.0 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 0.5; Dividend yield: 2.6%; TSINetwork Rating: Above Average; www.walmart .com) aims to spur its online sales with a new plan called ShippingPass that offers U.S. shoppers unlimited threeday shipping for $50 a year. This should help it compete with Amazon’s Prime service, which offers two-day shipping for an annual fee of $99.

Thanks to investments like this, Wal-Mart’s online sales jumped 17% in the first quarter of its 2016 fiscal year, which ended April 30, 2015.

Wal-Mart is also starting to see the benefits of its efforts to improve sales at its U.S. stores, including speeding up checkout lines and opening smaller stores. Same-stores sales in the U.S. (62% of total sales) rose 1.1%, the third straight quarter of growth.

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IBM’s shares fell from $190 in October 2014 to $150 in December. That’s because many businesses are shifting to cheaper cloud computing platforms and spending less on IBM’s mainframes and consulting services. That has forced it to abandon its ambitious 2015 earnings target of $20.00 a share. But the company has a long history of shifting from unprofitable businesses to fast-growing ones. And we feel its new plan to focus on cloud computing and analytics software will spur its earnings for years to come. To top it off, IBM’s strong balance sheet gives it lots of room to keep buying back shares and raising its dividend. INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS MACHINES CORP. $165 (New York symbol IBM, Conservative Growth Portfolio, Manufacturing & Industry sector; Shares outstanding: 985.0 million; Market cap: $162.5 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 1.8; Dividend yield: 2.7%; TSINetwork Rating: Above Average; www.ibm.com) traces its history back to 1911. Today, it’s one of the world’s largest computer companies, with operations in over 175 countries....

GANNETT CO., INC. $35 (New York symbol GCI; Conservative Growth Portfolio, Consumer sector: Shares outstanding: 227.8 million; Market cap: $8.0 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 1.4; Dividend yield: 2.3%; TSINetwork Rating: Average; www.gannett.com) publishes newspapers in the U.S. and U.K., including USAToday, its flagship paper. The company also owns 46 TV stations and websites that attract over 39 million unique visitors a month. In the three months ended March 29, 2015, Gannett’s revenue rose 4.9%, to $1.5 billion from $1.4 billion a year earlier. Strong gains at the broadcasting and digital divisions (49% of the total) offset an 8.8% decline at the publishing businesses (51%) due to weak ad revenue. Earnings improved 4.3%, to $0.49 a share from $0.47. The company still plans to spin off its publishing operations as a separate firm that will keep the Gannett name. The remaining company, called Tegna (New York symbol TGNA), will own the broadcast and Internet businesses....

These three companies have a long history of developing cutting-edge products. That’s partly why they’re hitting new multi-year highs. However, disruptive new technologies could quickly overtake their latest offerings and slow their growth. APPLE INC. $129 (Nasdaq symbol AAPL; Aggressive Growth Portfolio, Manufacturing & Industry sector; Shares outstanding: 5.8 billion; Market cap: $748.2 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 3.7; Dividend yield: 1.5%; TSINetwork Rating: Average; www.apple.com) aims to cut its reliance on the iPhone smartphone, which supplies nearly 70% of its revenue, with several new products....

GOOGLE INC. (Nasdaq symbols GOOG $539 [class C non-voting] and GOOGL $549 [class A voting]); Aggressive Growth Portfolio, Manufacturing & Industry sector; Shares outstanding: 680.6 million; Market cap: $366.8 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 5.5; No dividends paid; TSINetwork Rating: Above Average; www.google.com) may launch a paid version of its popular YouTube video-streaming website later this year. By paying a monthly fee, viewers would be able to watch videos without advertising. That would help YouTube compete with other streaming services, including Netflix and Hulu, and cut its reliance on selling ads. The company would have to share most of these subscription fees with content providers. Still, a subscription service could generate $2 billion of additional revenue a year for Google; the company’s total revenue was $66.0 billion in 2014. Shareholders should continue to hold their class A shares, but we recommend the cheaper class C stock for new buying....

NCR CORP. $30 (New York symbol NCR; Aggressive Growth Portfolio, Manufacturing & Industry sector; Shares outstanding: 168.6 million; Market cap: $5.1 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 0.8; No dividends paid; TSINetwork Rating: Average; www.ncr.com) gets 54% of its revenue from automated teller machines (ATMs). It also makes cash registers and self-serve checkouts (31% of revenue) and kiosks for theatres and arenas (10%). The remaining 5% comes from maintaining this equipment. NCR is cutting its reliance on ATMs by purchasing other companies. In February 2013, it paid $788 million for Israel-based Retalix, whose software helps retailers manage their sales and track inventory. Companies with a combined 70,000 locations in over 50 countries use Retalix’s products. In January 2014, NCR acquired Digital Insight, whose software helps over 1,000 banks and credit unions manage online and mobile transactions, for $1.65 billion....

The oil price drop has prompted these two producers to shed less profitable businesses. That brightens their long-term prospects, but we prefer Chevron, as its refineries benefit from cheaper crude. CHEVRON CORP. $110 (New York symbol CVX; Conservative Growth Portfolio, Resources sector; Shares outstanding: 1.9 billion; Market cap: $209.0 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 1.1; Dividend yield: 3.9%; TSINetwork Rating: Above Average; www. chevron.com) recently sold its 50% stake in Caltex Australia, which owns an oil refinery and 1,800 gas stations in Australia, for $3.6 billion. The deal is part of Chevron’s plan to sell $15 billion worth of nonessential businesses by 2017. Even with these sales, the company’s oil output will probably average 3.1 million barrels a day in 2017, up 20.6% from 2.57 million in 2014....