Last November, I announced my intention to create a portfolio of 10 companies that investors had effectively thrown away and given up on, in the hope of showing that deep-value investing, and contrarian thinking, can actually be a very successful investing method. I dubbed this the “One Person’s Trash Is Another Person’s Treasure” portfolio and, over a 10-week span, I highlighted companies that I thought fit this bill and would expect to drastically outperform the benchmark S&P 500 over the coming 12 months. If you’re interested in the reasoning behind why I chose these companies, then I encourage you to review my synopsis of each portfolio selection:
Exelon
QLogic
Dendreon
Dell
Staples
Arkansas Best
Arch Coal
Skullcandy
France Telecom
Xerox
Now, let’s get to the portfolio and see how it fared this week:
| Company | Cost Basis | Shares | Total Value | Return |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Exelon Corporation (NYSE:EXC) | $31.25 | 31.68 | $1,096.13 | 10.7% |
| QLogic Corporation (NASDAQ:QLGC) | $11.46 | 86.39 | $815.52 | (17.6%) |
| Dendreon Corporation (NASDAQ:DNDN) | $5.97 | 165.82 | $654.99 | (33.8%) |
| Dell Inc. (NASDAQ:DELL) | $13.37 | 74.05 | $990.05 | 0% |
| Staples, Inc. (NASDAQ:SPLS) | $13.48 | 73.44 | $1,114.08 | 12.5% |
| Arkansas Best Corporation (NASDAQ:ABFS) | $10.83 | 91.41 | $1,624.36 | 64.1% |
| Arch Coal Inc (NYSE:ACI) | $7.03 | 140.83 | $750.62 | (24.2%) |
| Skullcandy Inc (NASDAQ:SKUL) | $6.71 | 147.54 | $829.17 | (16.2%) |
| France Telecom SA (ADR) (NYSE:FTE) | $11.64 | 85.05 | $891.32 | (10%) |
| Xerox Corporation (NYSE:XRX) | $8.16 | 121.32 | $1,068.83 | 8% |
| Cash | $0.06 | |||
| Dividends receivable | $42.56 | |||
| Total commission | ($100.00) | |||
| Original investment | $10,000.00 | |||
| S&P 500 performance | 10.2% | |||
| Performance relative to S&P 500 | (11.4%) |
Source: Yahoo! Finance.
This week’s winner
Supplanting trucking company Arkansas Best Corporation (NASDAQ:ABFS) — which has shot to the moon on takeover speculation and a resolution with its union — was coal miner Arch Coal Inc (NYSE:ACI). Arch tacked on 7.5% this week following an article from Forbes on Monday that highlighted the company’s attempt to forge export partnerships on the West Coast of the U.S. to Asia-Pacific nations like China that have a big demand for thermal coal for electricity-generating purposes. Both India and China are still very early in their industrialization process and the need for coal in these regions is expected to remain robust for at least the next decade, playing perfectly into Arch Coal Inc (NYSE:ACI)’s strategy.
This week’s loser
On the other side of the coin was networking equipment maker QLogic Corporation (NASDAQ:QLGC), which tanked 4.8% on the week after disclosing that its CEO, Simon Biddiscombe, had resigned on Friday. In the interim, QLogic’s CFO, Jean Hu, will be the acting CEO. Anytime the management of a company changes, it provides a level of uncertainty that’s bound to unnerve investors. I’d urge current shareholders (of which I’m one) to remember that QLogic Corporation (NASDAQ:QLGC) has been consistently profitable for years, has $5 in net cash per share, and is poised to benefit from higher infrastructure spending. Patience will pay off here!
Also in the news…
Credit: Dell Inc. (NASDAQ:DELL)
The story was somewhat similar for office supply chain Staples, Inc. (NASDAQ:SPLS), which reported its first-quarter results on Tuesday. But, unlike with Dell Inc. (NASDAQ:DELL), investors seem quite pleased with the company’s progress in combating online competition. Even with weakness seen in Europe and Australia during the quarter, Staples held to its full-year EPS forecast and plans to utilize its direct-to-consumer operations as the backbone for its future growth prospects. Between plans to shrink its square footage and focus on its Web-based sales, and the pending merger of OfficeMax Inc (NYSE:OMX) and Office Depot Inc (NYSE:ODP), which should yield it customers by store attrition, Staples, Inc. (NASDAQ:SPLS) looks to be a company on the mend.
Finally, if you like money, then you’re going to love printing service and IT-software specialist Xerox Corporation (NYSE:XRX), which declared a $0.0575-per-share dividend on Tuesday. The dividend will be payable to shareholders on July 31, 2013, and marks the second quarter in a row that it’ll be paying a stipend of $0.0575. With IT software and services slowly growing into the primary business for Xerox Corporation (NYSE:XRX), you can expect sales and cash flow to stabilize and this dividend to grow consistently over the coming years.
We can do better
This marks the third week in a row that this deep-discount and contrarian portfolio has outperformed the S&P 500 and gained ground. Although this week’s gains were modest — and once again fueled by Arkansas Best Corporation (NASDAQ:ABFS)’s incredible run higher — I’ll be looking for continued outperformance over the long run as investors abandon speculative investments and seek out deeply discounted turnaround plays. We can and will continue to do better!
Check back next week for the latest update on this portfolio and its 10 components.
The article One Person’s Trash Is Another Person’s Treasure Portfolio originally appeared on Fool.com and is written by Sean Williams.
Fool contributor Sean Williams owns shares of QLogic, Dell Inc. (NASDAQ:DELL), Skullcandy Inc (NASDAQ:SKUL), and France Telecom SA (ADR) (NYSE:FTE), but has no material interest in any other companies mentioned in this article. You can follow him on CAPS under the screen name TMFUltraLong, track every pick he makes under the screen name TrackUltraLong, and check him out on Twitter, where he goes by the handle @TMFUltraLong.The Motley Fool owns shares of Dendreon Corporation (NASDAQ:DNDN), France Telecom, Skullcandy, and Staples, and recommends Exelon Corporation (NYSE:EXC) and France Telecom.
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