Updating C.R. BARD INC., WEYERHAEUSER CO. and 3M COMPANY

Article Excerpt

C.R. BARD INC. $109 (www.crbard.com) has raised its quarterly dividend by 5.6%, to $0.19 a share from $0.18. The new annual rate of $0.76 yields 0.7%. The medical-device maker has now raised its dividend each year for the past 38 years. Buy. WEYERHAEUSER CO. $21 (www.weyerhaeuser.com) earned $3 million, or nil per share, in the three months ended March 31, 2011. That’s a big improvement over the $15 million, or $0.07 a share, that it lost a year earlier. These figures exclude unusual items, such as gains on sales of timberlands. Sales rose 11.2%, to $1.6 billion from $1.4 billion. Higher Chinese lumber demand helped offset lower new housing starts in the U.S. Hold. 3M COMPANY $93 (www.3m.com) makes over 55,000 consumer and industrial products. The company continues to spend around 5.5% of its sales on research. Thanks to a steady stream of new products, 3M expects its sales to rise by 7% to 8% a year. That’s well above its historical…