The materials sector includes thirteen industries all related to mining, making and delivering essential commodities. The industries are: agricultural inputs; aluminum; building materials; chemicals; coal; copper; industrial metals and minerals; paper; silver; specialty chemicals; steel.

Today I'm reviewing a large-cap steel firm named Nucor Corporation. It's trading ticker symbol is NUE. This is my first time reviewing NUE!

Nucor Corp and its affiliates manufacture steel and steel products. They also produce direct reduced iron for use in the steel mills. The company is involved in every phase of steelmaking.

It serves customers in the United States and internationally. It operates in three segments: Steel Mills, Steel Products, and Raw Materials. 

The Steel Mills segment produces hot-rolled, cold-rolled, and galvanized sheet steel products; hollow structural section steel tubing, steel electrical conduit, plate steel, and structural steel products. This segment sells its products to steel service centers, fabricators, and manufacturers in automotive, energy, agricultural, heavy equipment, and transportation sectors. 

The Steel Products segment produces steel joists and joist girders, steel decks, fabricated concrete reinforcing and cold finished steel products, steel fasteners, metal building systems, steel gratings and expanded metal, and wire and wire mesh products to general contractors, fabricators, distributors, and manufacturers. 

The Raw Materials segment produces direct reduced iron; processes ferrous and nonferrous metals; brokers ferrous and nonferrous metals, pig iron, hot briquetted iron; supplies ferro-alloys; and processes ferrous and nonferrous scrap metal, as well as engages in the natural gas drilling operations. 

 The company offers its products through its in-house sales forces; and internal distribution and trading companies. 

The company was founded in 1940 and is based in Charlotte, North Carolina.

I use three key data points to gauge the value of any dividend equity or fund like Nucor Corporation: 

(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. 

NUE Price

Nucor's price per share was $62.69 at yesterday's market close. A year ago its price was $53.60 for a gain of $9.09 per share.  

Assuming Nucor's price will trade in the range of $55 to $75 next year, perhaps that $9.09 gain could repeat and take Nucor's current $62.69 price to $71.78 by mid-September, 2019. 

NUE Dividends

Nucor's most recent quarterly dividend was $0.38  declared September 6th and payable November 9th. That dividend was increased from $0.3775 in February 2018.

At this most recent $0.38 quarterly pay rate, Nucor's annual dividend is calculated at $1.52 yielding 2.4% at yesterday's closing $62.69 price.

Gains For NUE?

Adding the $1.52 estimated annual dividend to the $9.09 estimated year over year price gain for Nucor makes a $10.61 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 $62.69 recent price buys 16 Nucor Corporation 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 $10.61 gross gain leaves a net gain of $9.98 X 16 shares 

= $159.68

or a near 16% net gain on a $1003.04 investment.

Therefore, Nucor Corporation, whose trading ticker symbol is NUE, now shows a possible 16% net gain including a 2.4% dividend yield. 

Fifteen brokers cover this stock:

Eight say "buy" NUE.

Three say NUE will "outperform" its peers.

Three say NUE is a stock to "hold".

One says NUE will "underperform" its peers.

Thus, the analyst consensus recommendation number is 1.8 or "outperform".

The median price target set by those fifteen brokers is $4.22 over the $71.78 year over year price target I named. 

So, you could look at all those various numbers this way, Nucor Corporation has made money, is making money, and could net a 16% net annual gain including a 2.4% 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 Nucor Corporation is worth your time and money.