My personal preference is that companies keep their stock price below $200 per share. My logic is simple: it makes it easier to evenly distribute your investment portfolio.

My balanced portfolio logic is quite simple. If you want to balance your portfolio quarterly between 10 great stocks, it is easier with lower-priced stocks. With a stock that is trading at $200, you can easily hold the correct number of shares to be within $100 (half the per share price) of the target value. With a stock that is trading at $1200 per share, the variance is now $600 which can easily throw off the balanced exposure for a small investor like most of my readers.

I discuss two types of portfolios on this site and in my book, The Confident Investor, which you can buy wherever books are sold. The more cautious portfolio suggests a target portfolio allocation for each purchase but is based on a fast-response momentum philosophy that moves that allocation to whichever stock is increasing in price at the moment. The stocks to invest in are chosen by the quality of the company and I list them on my Watch List. This portfolio regularly beats the market over time by at least 20% (if not 50%) regardless if the market is bull, bear, or flat.

The second type of portfolio is much more aggressive and often is 3X-4X the market increase in a bull market. However, it is not as safe in a flat or bear market. This strategy evenly divides a portfolio among 15 great companies that are growing their stock price faster than the others on my Watch List. I recalculate the top 15 and rebalance the portfolio quarterly.

In both portfolios, it is easier to balance the portfolio or allocate each portion of the portfolio if the stock price is under $200. When the stock is over $200, most investors that are working with a portfolio under $250,000 find themselves to heavy or too light in high-cost stocks.

You can see the performance of my version of both portfolios by reading my regular posts that are in the category Weekly Portfolio Gain. You do not need to have read my book to see these results although you may not understand how I create the list of companies.

Stock splits, once considered a way to keep shares affordable for mom-and-pop investors, are rare today as companies aspire to new heights.

Amazon [stckqut]AMZN[/stckqut], Google [stckqut]GOOGL[/stckqut], and Priceline [stckqut]PCLN[/stckqut] are recent examples of companies that have let their stock prices approach or exceed a four-figure price.

In the 1990s, when stock picking for one’s own account was in vogue, companies also considered splits a way to keep shares affordable for mom-and-pop investors. Even though nothing changes fundamentally about the company with a stock split—it’s like trading a dime for two nickels—splits used to generate excitement and, often, a short-term pop for the shares.

In recent years, though, individuals have gravitated toward index funds. And institutional investors don’t like stock splits, because increasing the number of shares increases their trading costs.

The godfather of the no-split camp is Berkshire Hathaway Inc. [stckqut]BRK.A[/stckqut] Chairman Warren Buffett. Berkshire’s Class A shares are the priciest U.S.-listed equities at the time of this writing. For years, Mr. Buffett said he didn’t want to split the shares because he didn’t want to attract people who found such a move to be a good reason for buying a stock. “People who buy for non-value reasons are likely to sell for non-value reasons,” he said in a 1984 letter to shareholders.

There are reasons behind the trend. Before the rise of discount brokerages and a decline in trading commissions in the 1990s, even small-time investors often had to buy shares in round lots of 100, which meant that a high price could make such a purchase prohibitively expensive. These days, though, retail investors can buy as little as one share, and often pay commissions of $10 or less.

Academics who have studied share splits have also posited that executives who split their company’s stock may be motivated by a desire to keep their share prices from looking expensive. Now, some companies and their investors seem to treat higher stock prices as a sign of accomplishment. Of course, this bragado is just as foolish as calling a $50 stock: cheap.

A fair concern is companies may have held off on splitting shares in recent years in response to the financial crisis, when stock prices dropped sharply and some big companies were humbled into performing reverse splits to raise their share price to avoid being delisted. Reverse stock splits are embarrassing and painful and of course being delisted is the equivalent of death in the stock market.

Amazon founder and CEO Jeff Bezos hasn’t ruled out the idea of a split, which the firm did three times as a young public company. A shareholder at Amazon’s annual meeting in Seattle on Tuesday asked Mr. Bezos if he would consider splitting the company’s shares to give members of the middle class and younger people the chance to afford the shares.

You can purchase my book wherever books are sold such as Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and Books A Million. It is available in e-book formats for Nook, Kindle, and iPad.

Source: Amazon’s Brush With $1,000 Signals the Death of the Stock Split

Largest Companies by Revenue in Each State 2015

 

Thank you to Broadviewnet for putting out this infographic.  Here is the data:

State 2014 Company 2014 Revenue (Billion) 2015 Company 2015 Revenue (Billion) Headquarters
AL Regions Bank $5.89 Regions Bank $5.40 Birmingham AL
AK Alaska Permanent Fund Corporation $4.44 GCI Inc. $0.91 Anchorage AK
AZ Avnet Inc. $25.45 Avnet Inc. $27.49 Phoenix AZ
AR Wal-Mart Stores $476.29 Wal-Mart Stores $485.65 Bentonville AR
CA Chevron Corporation $228.84 Chevron Corporation $211.97 Sam Ramon CA
CO Arrow Electronics Inc. $21.35 Arrow Electronics Inc. $22.78 Inverness CO
CT General Electric $146.04 General Electric $148.58 Fairfield CT
DE E.I du Pont de Nemours and Company $36.14 E.I du Pont de Nemours and Company $36.04 Wilmington DE
FL World Fuel Services $41.56 World Fuel Services $43.38 Miami FL
GA Home Depot International Inc. $85.53 Home Depot International Inc. $85.90 Atlanta GA
HI Hawaiian Electric Industries Inc. $3.23 Hawaiian Electric Industries Inc. $3.23 Honolulu HI
ID Micro Technology Inc. $9.07 Albertson’s LLC. $23.56 Boise ID
IL Archer Daniels Midland $89.80 The Boeing Company $90.76 Chicago IL
IN WellPoint $71.02 Anthem Inc. $73.87 Indianapolis IN
IA Transamerica Life Insurance Company $19.04 Transamerica Life Insurance Company $23.34 Cedar Rapids IA
KS Sprint Communications Inc. $34.56 Koch Industries $115.00 Wichita KS
KY Humana Inc. $42.31 Humana Inc. $48.50 Louisville KY
LA CenturyLink Inc. $18.09 CenturyLink Inc. $18.03 Monroe LA
ME Hannaford Bros. Co. $3.98 Hannaford Bros. Co. $4.41 Scarborough ME
MD Lockheed Martin $45.35 Lockheed Martin $45.60 Bethesda MD
MA Liberty Mutual Holding Company Inc. $38.50 Liberty Mutual Holding Company Inc. $36.94 Boston MA
MI General Motors $155.42 General Motors $155.92 Detroit MI
MN Cargill Inc. $136.65 UnitedHealth Group $130.47 Minnetonka MN
MS Sanderson Farms Inc. $2.68 Koch Foods Incorporated $2.80 Flowood MS
MO Express Scripts Holding $104.09 Express Scripts Holding $100.88 St. Louis MO
MT Stillwater Mining Company $1.03 Stillwater Mining Company $0.94 Billings MT
NE Berkshire Hathaway $182.15 Berkshire Hathaway $194.67 Omaha NE
NV Las Vegas Sands Corp. $13.76 Las Vegas Sands Corp. $14.58 Paradise NV
NH Sprague Resources LP $4.60 C&S Wholesale Grocers Inc. $21.70 Keene NH
NJ Johnson & Johnson $71.31 Johnson & Johnson $74.33 New Brunswick NJ
NM Presbyterian Healthcare Services $4.60 Presbyterian Healthcare Services $2.05 Albuquerque NM
NY Verizon Communications $120.55 Verizon Communications $127.07 New York NY
NC Bank of America $101.69 Bank of America $95.18 Charlotte NC
ND MDU Resources Group Inc. $4.46 MDU Resources Group Inc. $4.67 Bismarck ND
OH Cardinal Health $101.09 The Kroger Co. $108.46 Cincinnati OH
OK Love’s Travel Stops & Country Stores Inc. $26.09 Love’s Travel Stops & Country Stores Inc. $26.09 Oklahoma City OK
OR Nike Inc. $25.31 Nike Inc. $27.79 Beaverton OR
PA AmeriSourceBergen $87.95 AmeriSourceBergen $119.56 Chesterbrook PA
RI CVS Caremark $126.76 CVS Caremark $139.36 Woonsocket RI
SC Sonoco Products Company $4.48 Sonoco Products Company $5.01 Hartsville SC
SD Sanford Health $3.10 Poet LLC. $6.00 Sioux Falls SD
TN FedEx Corporation $44.28 FedEx Corporation $45.46 Memphis TN
TX Exxon Mobil $438.25 Exxon Mobil $411.93 Irving TX
UT Huntsman Corporation $11.07 Huntsman Corporation $11.57 Salt Lake City UT
VT Keurig Green Mountain Inc. $4.35 Keurig Green Mountain Inc. $4.70 Waterbury VT
VA Freddie Mac $81.22 The Long & Foster Companies Inc. $42.70 Chantilly VA
WA CostCo Wholesale $105.15 CostCo Wholesale $112.64 Issaquah WA
WV West Virginia University Hospitals Inc. $1.38 Mylan Pharmaceuticals Inc. $1.24 Morgantown WV
WI Johnson Controls Inc. $42.73 Johnson Controls Inc. $42.82 Milwaukee WI
WY Cloud Peak Energy Inc. $1.39 Cloud Peak Energy Inc. $1.39 Gillette WY

 

Mr. Buffett, who is 84 years old, has never wavered in the principles he learned from his mentor, Benjamin Graham: Stocks are ownership stakes in businesses, not pieces of paper or blips on an electronic ticker; their market prices often are driven by the mood swings of investors rather than by the value of the underlying businesses; and investing is worthwhile only when value exceeds price by an amount great enough to create a “margin of safety.”

Nor has he ever changed his views on three of the most powerful weapons in the investing arsenal: cash, emotion and information.

Source: What You Should — and Shouldn’t — Learn from Warren Buffett – MoneyBeat – WSJ

I recently came across this list on Forbes on the largest 25 tax payers. Forbes does a bit of analysis on each of them. It is probably worth your time to jump over, but I thought I would give the highlights here:

 

Rank of tax expense

Company

Symbol

Effective Tax Rate

1 ExxonMobil XOM 39%
2 Chevron Corporation CVX 43%
3 Apple Inc. AAPL 25%
4 Wells Fargo & Co. WFC 31.2%
5 JP Morgan Chase & Co. JPM 26%
6 Wal-Mart Stores WMT 31%
7 ConocoPhillips COP 51.5%
8 Berkshire Hathaway Inc. BRK 28%
9 IBM IBM 24%
10 Microsoft Corporation MSFT 22.8%
11 Philip Morris International Inc. PM 29.5%
12 Goldman Sachs GS 33%
14 Comcast Corporation CMCS 32%
14 The Procter & Gamble Co. PG 23.5%
15 Johnson & Johnson JNJ 23.7%
16 Intel Corporation INTC 23.6%
17 Occidental Petroleum Corp. OXY 42%
18 UnitedHealth Group UHG 35.9%
19 The Walt Disney Company DIS 32.7%
20 AT&T T 27.8%
21 Oracle ORCL 21.4%
22 The Coca-Cola Company KO 23.1%
23 The Home Depot Inc. HD 37.2%
24 McDonald’s MCD 32.4%
25 Google GOOG 19.4%