Today I'm reviewing a mid-cap industrial metals and minerals firm named Compass Minerals International, Inc. It's trading ticker symbol is CMP. 

Compass Minerals International Inc is associated with the mining industry. It produces minerals, including salt, sulfate of potash specialty fertilizer and magnesium chloride.

It serves customers in the United States, Canada, Brazil, and the United Kingdom. It operates in three segments: Salt, Plant Nutrition North America, and Plant Nutrition South America. 

The Salt segment provides products for use as a deicer for roadways, consumer, and professional use; as an ingredient in chemical production; for water treatment, human, and animal nutrition; and for various other consumer and industrial uses, as well as provides records management services.

The Plant Nutrition North America segment offers sulfate of potash specialty fertilizers in various grades. This segment provides its products to distributors and retailers of crop inputs, as well as growers.

The Plant Nutrition South America segment offers various specialty plant nutrients and supplements; water and wastewater treatment chemicals for cleaning, decontaminating, and purifying water; and process chemicals for industrial use.

The company was formerly known as Salt Holdings Corporation and changed its name to Compass Minerals International, Inc. in December 2003. Compass Minerals International, Inc. was founded in 1993 and is headquartered in Overland Park, Kansas.

I use three key data points to gauge the value of any dividend equity or fund like Compass Minerals International, Inc.: 

(1) Price

(2) Dividends

(3) Returns

Besides those three, four more keys  will finally unlock an equity or fund in which to invest.

But those first three primary keys, best tell whether a company has made, is making, and will make money. 

CMP Price

Compass's price per share was $62.75 at yesterday's market close. A year ago its price was $60.10 for a gain of $2.65 per share.  

Assuming Compass's price will trade in the range of $60 to $75 next year, perhaps that $2.65 gain could repeat and take Compass's current $62.75 price to $65.40 by mid-September, 2019. 

CMP Dividends

Compass's most recent quarterly dividend was $0.72  declared August 2nd and payable September 17th. That dividend was increased from $0.695 in March 2017.

At this most recent $0.72 quarterly pay rate, Compass's annual dividend is calculated at $2.88 yielding 4.6% at yesterday's closing $62.75 price.

Gains For CMP?

Adding the $2.88 estimated annual dividend to the $2.65 estimated year over year price gain for Compass makes a $5.53  gross annual per share gain, which will be reduced by costs to trade the shares.  

 A little over $1,000.00 invested today at the $62.75 recent price buys 16 Compass Minerals International, Inc. shares. 

A $10 broker fee paid half at purchase and half at sale costs $0.63 per share

Subtracting that $0.63 brokerage cost from the estimated $5.53 gross gain leaves a net gain of $4.90 X 16 shares 

= $78.40

or a nearly 8% net gain on a $1004.00 investment.

Therefore, Compass Minerals International, Inc., whose trading ticker symbol is CMP, now shows a possible 8% net gain including a 4.6% dividend yield. 

Ten brokers cover this stock:

Three say "buy" CMP.

Two say CMP will "outperform" its peers.

Three say CMP is a stock to "hold".

Two say CMP will "underperform" its peers.

Thus, the analyst consensus recommendation number is 2.4 or "outperform".

The median price target set by those ten brokers is $7.38 over the $65.40 year over year price target I named. 

So, you could look at all those various numbers this way,  Compass Minerals International, Inc. has made money, is making money, and could net a 8% to 16% net annual gain including a 4.6% dividend yield. It could be more, it could be less.

The above speculation is based on past year performance. Actual results remain to be seen. Those results will determine if Compass Minerals International, Inc. is worth your time and money.