Mr. Market And A Valuation Of The Dow For Value Investors – July 2017

Mr. Market’s Mental State

Legendary value investor Benjamin Graham is probably most famous for his Mr. Market parable. In the story, an investor is greeted each day by Mr. Market, who offers to purchase the investor’s stocks. Every offer is different, and sometimes the price is insanely high, sometimes it seems fair, and other times it is clearly too low. But one thing remains the same – the intrinsic value of the investments does not change.  As a result, the investor is left to decide when to buy and sell based on the relationship between the intrinsic value and the price Mr. Market is offering.

All value investors today should keep the analogy in mind, and implement the overall concept. To assist in that goal, ModernGraham has various tools available, and the infographic shown above is one of them, displaying a summary of the valuations of 878 companies reviewed by ModernGraham.

This month, out of the 878 companies reviewed by ModernGraham, the average PEmg ratio (price over normalized earnings) is 26.72 and the average company is trading at 121.83% of its intrinsic value. Last month, the average PEmg ratio was 26.78 and the average company was trading at 122.1% of its intrinsic value.

The highest PEmg average we have seen while tracking this information was 26.78 in July 2017 while the lowest PEmg average was 22.25 in February 2016. The highest average intrinsic value was 122.1% in July 2017 and the lowest average intrinsic value was 103.19% in February 2016.

Month Average PEmg Average % of value, 200% outlier Average % of value, 500% outlier Defensive % Enterprising % Speculative % Undervalued % Fairly Valued % Overvalued %
August 2014 24.36 90.57% 120.87% n/a n/a n/a n/a n/a n/a
September 2014 25.37 93.37% 120.58% n/a n/a n/a n/a n/a n/a
October 2014 24.29 90.24% 116.67% 12% 35% 53% 31% 21% 48%
November 2014 25.32 90.61% 117.38% 12% 35% 53% 29% 21% 50%
December 2014 26.17 92.28% 117.00% 11% 34% 55% 28% 23% 49%
January 2015 25.63 93.48% 119.68% 10% 34% 55% 30% 20% 50%
February 2015 25.79 92.72% 115.81% 10% 35% 55% 33% 19% 49%
March 2015 25.79 88.03% 114.81% 10% 35% 55% 31% 19% 49%
April 2015 25.64 86.18% 112.23% 9.9% 35.2% 54.9% 32.1% 19.4% 48.5%
May 2015 25.17 86.64% 112.99% 9.1% 36.1% 54.8% 32.1% 20.4% 47.4%
June 2015 25.47 86.43% 112.50% 8.7% 34.7% 56.5% 30.0% 21.2% 48.8%
July 2015 25.24 85.65% 118.11% 9.6% 33.1% 57.3% 30.9% 19.3% 49.6%
August 2015 25.08 86.79% 116.39% 9.8% 32.7% 57.5% 29.5% 21.0% 49.5%
September 2015 23.2 82.45% 103.59% 9.4% 32.6% 57.9% 35.7% 18.9% 45.5%
October 2015 22.95 81.80% 101.69% 10.5% 31.7% 57.8% 35.5% 18.7% 45.8%
November 2015 23.97 84.84% 110.89% 10.1% 32.2% 57.7% 32.0% 19.2% 48.7%
December 2015 23.27 84.55% 115.56% 10.6% 31.5% 57.8% 33.0% 17.8% 49.2%
January 2016 22.87 82.61% 110.62% 10.9% 30.8% 58.3% 35.9% 16.8% 47.3%
February 2016 22.25 79.54% 103.19% 10.9% 30.7% 58.4% 36.7% 16.3% 47.0%
March 2016 23.07 83.92% 106.76% 11.3% 29.9% 58.8% 33.4% 19.0% 47.6%
April 2016 23.37 83.65% 110.61% 11.3% 29.9% 58.8% 32.5% 18.8% 48.7%
May 2016 23.78 82.90% 112.17% 11.4% 29.9% 58.8% 31.3% 18.5% 50.2%
June 2016 24.21 84.77% 115.18% 11.6% 30.0% 58.5% 30.7% 17.3% 52.0%
July 2016 23.83 86.40% 117.49% 11.8% 29.9% 58.2% 30.1% 19.0% 50.8%
August 2016 24.68 89.40% 117.12% 11.9% 30.7% 57.4% 29.6% 19.3% 51.1%
September 2016 23.86 91.21% 115.16% 11.2% 30.1% 58.7% 28.6% 18.4% 53.0%
October 2016 24.07 91.41% 117.93% 11.2% 30.2% 58.6% 28.4% 18.5% 53.2%
November 2016 24.2 92.55% 119.16% 11.0% 30.3% 58.7% 28.0% 17.8% 54.2%
December 2016 24.56 93.20% 121.14% 10.5% 31.1% 58.4% 28.0% 17.6% 54.4%
January 2017 24.8 93.57% 121.72% 9.5% 32.8% 57.7% 26.5% 17.0% 56.5%
February 2017 25.54 80.97% 111.6% 8.9% 33.4% 57.7% 25.1% 17.9% 57.0%
March 2017 26.4 82.96% 118.0% 8.2% 33.8% 58.0% 24.6% 17.0% 58.4%
April 2017 26.48 82.59% 119.2% 8.1% 33.5% 58.4% 24.6% 17.6% 57.8%
May 2017 26.08 81.70% 117.4% 8.1% 33.5% 58.4% 25.8% 16.0% 58.2%
June 2017 26.78 83.33% 122.1% 8.1% 33.5% 58.4% 24.2% 16.3% 59.5%
July 2017 26.72 81.97% 121.8% 8.2% 33.3% 58.5% 23.7% 16.6% 59.7%

Valuation of the Dow

Each month ModernGraham takes a look at the Dow Jones Industrial Average, listing out each individual component in an easy to read table, and calculates a value for the index that is based on the ModernGraham valuation model’s estimates for intrinsic values for each component. Over time this figure can be useful for determining whether the market as a whole is undervalued or overvalued.

(Click on image to enlarge)

^DJI Chart

^DJI data by YCharts

At the time of writing, the Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA) was at 21,574.73. The ModernGraham Valuation of the DJIA was 18,787.53. As a result, the DJIA was trading at 114.84% of its estimated value. This figure is above the ModernGraham margin of error, and therefore it appears the DJIA is presently overvalued.

To see the individual valuation articles, please click on the company name in the table below.  For the investor type, a “D” indicates the company is suitable for the Defensive Investor, an “E” indicates the company is suitable for the Enterprising Investor, and an “S” indicates the company is considered speculative at this time.

Ticker Name with Link Investor Type Latest Valuation Date MG Value Recent Price Price as a percent of Value PEmg Ratio Dividend Yield
AXP American Express Company D 5/19/2016 $117.34 $85.52 72.88% 16.80 1.36%
AAPL Apple Inc. S 1/24/2017 $231.48 $150.08 64.83% 18.81 1.45%
BA Boeing Co E 6/13/2016 $201.69 $208.24 103.25% 28.33 1.83%
CAT Caterpillar Inc. S 8/27/2016 $0.00 $107.07 N/A 24.28 2.88%
CSCO Cisco Systems, Inc. D 1/11/2017 $37.19 $31.51 84.73% 15.76 3.14%
CVX Chevron Corporation S 3/15/2017 $0.00 $103.72 N/A 28.11 4.14%
DD E I Du Pont De Nemours And Co E 8/28/2016 $36.35 $84.00 231.09% 25.53 1.81%
DIS Walt Disney Co S 3/17/2017 $174.08 $105.75 60.75% 20.26 1.41%
GE General Electric Company S 7/21/2016 $0.26 $26.89 10342.31% 30.21 3.42%
GS Goldman Sachs Group Inc S 6/20/2016 $174.21 $223.31 128.18% 16.52 1.16%
HD Home Depot Inc S 2/22/2017 $203.38 $152.17 74.82% 28.82 1.75%
IBM International Business Machines Corp. S 3/13/2017 $94.03 $154.00 163.78% 11.81 3.57%
INTC Intel Corporation D 5/20/2016 $26.44 $34.53 130.60% 16.06 2.84%
JNJ Johnson & Johnson E 1/16/2017 $105.81 $134.46 127.08% 24.40 2.31%
JPM JPMorgan Chase & Co. D 7/24/2016 $96.69 $91.07 94.19% 16.86 1.98%
KO The Coca-Cola Co S 7/28/2016 $10.76 $44.67 415.15% 25.10 3.00%
MCD McDonald’s Corporation S 11/20/2016 $49.98 $153.96 308.04% 30.13 2.31%
MMM 3M Co E 12/13/2016 $135.24 $211.31 156.25% 27.99 2.06%
MRK Merck & Co., Inc. E 8/29/2016 $26.80 $62.41 232.87% 25.58 2.93%
MSFT Microsoft Corporation E 2/2/2017 $15.97 $73.30 458.99% 33.02 2.01%
NKE Nike Inc E 11/19/2016 $59.52 $57.65 96.86% 28.97 1.11%
PFE Pfizer Inc. S 3/9/2017 $7.21 $33.36 462.69% 19.06 3.60%
PG Procter & Gamble Co S 7/8/2016 $17.20 $88.64 515.35% 25.77 2.99%
TRV Travelers Companies Inc D 12/1/2016 $320.65 $125.53 39.15% 12.72 1.55%
UNH UnitedHealth Group Inc S 2/28/2017 $173.14 $186.85 107.92% 25.22 1.27%
UTX United Technologies Corporation D 5/18/2016 $174.94 $122.63 70.10% 16.03 2.09%
V Visa Inc E 6/26/2016 $89.37 $97.58 109.19% 42.06 1.41%
VZ Verizon Communications Inc. S 7/28/2016 $124.10 $43.36 34.94% 13.47 5.21%
WMT Wal-Mart Stores Inc S 5/20/2016 $39.55 $76.20 192.67% 16.82 2.57%
XOM Exxon Mobil Corporation S 2/9/2017 $0.00 $80.60 N/A 16.62 3.67%
 

Disclaimer: 

The author did not hold a position in any company mentioned in this article at the time of publication and had no intention of changing those holdings within the next 72 ...

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