Parent the best choice in these spinoffs

Article Excerpt

Spinoffs are a great way for companies to unlock hidden value, as the former parent and newly independent firm tend to outperform groups of comparable stocks for several years. But in the cases of Agilent and NCR, we prefer the parent companies to their former subsidiaries for new buying. AGILENT TECHNOLOGIES INC. $36 (New York symbol A; Aggressive Growth Portfolio, Manufacturing & Industry sector; Shares outstanding: 332.0 million; Market cap: $12.0 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 1.6; Dividend yield: 1.1%; TSINetwork Rating: Average; www.agilent.com) split into two publicly traded firms on November 1, 2014. One company kept the Agilent name and stock symbol and focuses on testing equipment for medical research labs. The other firm, called Keysight Technologies (see right), makes testing systems for electronics. Under the spinoff, Agilent shareholders received one Keysight share for every two shares they held. Excluding spinoff-related costs and other unusual items, Agilent earned $147 million, or $0.44 a share, in its fiscal 2015 third quarter, which…