Streetwise for Sunday, August 1, 2021

Each time the evening news holds court with a supposed Wall Street guru opining about the latest COVID-19 disaster facing the investment world, a cold shiver likely goes down your spine. Suddenly you dread looking where your portfolio will trade when the markets open the next morning.

You received and will continue to receive continual doses of this as investors will look for clues on whether the latest resurgence of Covid-19 (the D variety) around the world will derail a recovery of corporate profits and the economy.

Now, take a deep breath and relax. Excepting events such as war or bankruptcy, you are not facing, to borrow the title of Francis Ford Coppola’s 1979 epic war film, “Apocalypse Now.”

What you are facing is referred to as event risk, the occurrence of unforeseen exogenous events with the potential to denigrate the immediate future of a company and/or the overall market. Something we have seen too much of lately.

Unfortunately, event risk is more likely this month than at other times during the year. Why you ask? Because since 1970, August has historically proven to be one of the most volatile and dangerous months of the year. Specifically, up until this year, August has accounted for seven of the 50 sharpest monthly declines in the Dow Jones Industrial Average during that period, with an average decline of 8.9 percent.

Baseless commentary implying that Armageddon is right around the corner can result in even experienced investors giving some consideration to liquidating assets, despite adverse tax consequences and exiting stage left. This is wrong and is exactly the opposite of what you should do.

Yes, I know Wall Street can be brutal. This is especially true for investors with lesser resources on which to fall back on. And the fact that August has a history of crushing investors' illusions is not going to make your life any easier.

Event risk also becomes more prevalent during earnings season, although current reporting period has many companies chalking up results that are exceeding consensus estimates. And we will likely see a continuation of that trend when third quarter numbers are reported in October.

While you cannot prevent exogenous events from affecting your portfolio, positively or negatively, the effects are generally transitory and can be minimized through diversification.

Purchasing stocks with similar risk profiles can result in extraordinary returns...if Lady Luck smiles down upon you. Of course, the inherent risk is just as extraordinary. If you instead spread your selections across a wider spectrum of companies, your overall return may be lower, but you reduce the probability of a severe setback, regardless of economic circumstances

Diversification is sort of a modern-day alchemy. It has the effect of transforming a heterogeneous group of securities into a portfolio with predictable characteristics. Its secret is simple. The weakness of one security is balanced against the strength of another.

However, even a well-diversified portfolio is subject to some event risk. This is where dividends come into play. A dividend is a distribution of the earnings to you the shareholder. They are real money, not just some entry depicted on a balance sheet.

As I have said time and time again, ad nauseum, there is no more accurate indication of fiscal achievement in a publicly held company than a trend of rising dividends. And once a dividend is paid, the money leaves the company's control. Paid dividends are not subject to manipulation or interpretation.

Because rising dividends generally only come from rising earnings, the result of rising revenues, dividend trends can provide a strong indication as to the likelihood for share price appreciation.

Moreover, dividend yields are closely watched on Wall Street. When the yield on a stock becomes abnormally high, often due to a falling share price, it creates interest, with the resulting increase in demand often halting and even reversing a decline. Without dividends, you do not have this safety net.

Lauren Rudd is a Managing Director with Raymond James & Associates, Inc., member NYSE/SIPC. Contact him at 941-706-3449 or Lauren.Rudd@RaymondJames.com. All opinions are solely those of the author. This material is provided for informational purposes only, is not a recommendation and should not be relied on for investment decisions. Investing involves risk and you may incur a loss regardless of strategy selected. Past performance is no guarantee of future results.