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Recent Articles
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Waste Management’s Free Cash Flow Facing Pressure from Sustainability Initiatives
Dec 16, 2022
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Image Source: Waste Management’s 2022 Sustainability Report.
2023 will mark the 20th consecutive year that Waste Management has increased its dividend payout. Though free cash flow is facing pressure due to its sustainability growth initiatives that are driving total capital expenditures higher, the company’s valuable disposal capacity and pricing power across its municipal solid waste operations are a couple qualities that we like. Shares are trading about in line with our fair value estimate at the moment, as they boast a ~1.6% forward estimated annual dividend yield.
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Dividend Increases/Decreases for the Week of December 16
Dec 16, 2022
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Let's take a look at firms raising/lowering their dividends this week.
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Union Pacific Outperforming North American Rail Traffic Trends But Facing Inefficiencies and Inflation Hurdles
Dec 14, 2022
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Image Source: Union Pacific.
The rail industry may have avoided a labor strike, but North American rail traffic remains under pressure, while many operators are struggling with inflationary pressures and operational inefficiencies. Union Pacific remains our favorite way to play the rails, but 2022 has been a difficult year for the firm, with free cash flow coming under pressure as capital investments have soared so far in 2022. Union Pacific garners an ‘A’ rating by Moody’s, Fitch and S&P, so we’re not too worried about its large net debt position. Shares yield ~2.4% at the time of this writing, but we’re not pulling the trigger.
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Moderna’s Personalized Cancer Vaccine (PCV) Could Be a Game-Changer When Combined with Merck’s KEYTRUDA
Dec 13, 2022
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Image: Moderna’s therapeutics pipeline continues to advance, and the company recently received positive news regarding its personalized cancer vaccine (PCV), ID # mRNA-4157, when combined with Merck’s KEYTRUDA. Image Source: Moderna.
Moderna and Merck have revealed what could be a big breakthrough with respect to investigational cancer treatment, but we remind investors that the news is a Phase 2b study, and there is still a meaningful probability that the Phase 3 trial for the immunotherapy may be unsuccessful. Still, the Phase 2b results for the PCV-KEYTRUDA combination showed an impressive 44% reduction in the risk of recurrence or death in patients with late-stage melanoma, and the adverse effects from the combined PCV-KEYTRUDA therapy occurred in just 14.4% of patients, which was not terribly different than those receiving KEYTRUDA alone. There are a plethora of players dabbling in mRNA vaccine technology these days, and we remain excited about its future potential to improve patient outcomes, as much as we are about CRISPR gene-editing technology.
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