In a new research note, a Jefferies analyst combined the highest free cash flow yield with at least 10% return on invested capital and 6% return on assets over the past 10 years. This screen produced 14 outstanding stocks, and we focus on the five with the highest free cash flow yield: Western Digital Inc. (NASDAQ: WDC), Intel Corp. (NASDAQ: INTC), Cisco Systems Inc. (NASDAQ: CSCO), Oracle Corp. (NASDAQ: ORCL) and Emerson Electric Co. (NYSE: EMR).
Western Digital
This top tech company is a leader in the total addressable hard disk drive (HDD) market at a very strong 43%, and it also sports a very impressive 7.89 free cash flow yield. Western Digital attributed much of the gain in revenue growth in recent quarters to the consumer electronics/gaming unit, which saw the biggest upside in the fiscal fourth quarter, shipping 10.9 million units, up 67% year over year. This could help temper the current PC decline that is hurting some tech companies.
While most on Wall Street acknowledge that some believe that cloud data centers are being built using solid-state drives (SSD) and NAND flash memory, the vast majority of storage in the public cloud is stored on traditional HDDs, a positive for top companies like Western Digital in the space.
Western Digital investors are paid a 2% dividend. The Thomson/First Call consensus price target for the stock is $119.42. Shares closed Friday at $99.75.
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Intel
Intel was recently highlighted as one of the companies having among the highest shareholders cash returns at approximately 8%. This goes along with any outstanding free cash flow yield of 7.63%. The iconic chip giant had a stellar 2014 on the tailwind from continued PC and notebook sales, but it has suffered this year as PC sales have slowed. The stock has underperformed the S&P 500 year to date.
Intel warned first-quarter earnings and forward guidance would be less than expected, and it delivered just that earlier this month. The stock has turned up since and is offering patient investors a solid entry point.
Intel investors are paid an outstanding 3% dividend. The consensus target is posted at $34.95. Shares closed trading on Friday at $32.08.
Cisco
This is another top technology stock, and it is trading at a low 13.3 estimated 2015 earnings and boasts an outstanding 7.44 free cash flow yield. The networking giant also seems to have fought through numerous headwinds, including up and down demand from telecom carriers, weakness in emerging markets and threats to its very lucrative switching business. Analysts feel these are all going away. The company also stands to benefit from a better corporate spending environment in Europe, as well as continued growth here at home.
Cisco recently won an important contract for the Verizon build-out of the company’s next-generation 100 G metro network. While Cisco’s optical business is small as a part of total revenue, this win is seen by Wall Street as a significant endorsement of the investments Cisco has made into its optics business.
Cisco investors are paid a very solid 2.91% dividend. The consensus price target is $30.21, and shares closed Friday at $28.82.
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Oracle
This is yet another old-school large cap tech stock that is very reasonable valuation wise for investors. The stock trades at 15 times estimated 2015 earnings, and it sports a 7.03 free cash flow yield. Combined sales in Oracle’s cloud software, infrastructure and platform-as-a-service businesses were $527 million in the latest quarter, up about 29 percent from a year earlier. The company will report fiscal year-end numbers in mid to late June.
Co-Chief Executive Officer Mark Hurd said recently that Oracle plans to make almost all of its services available via the Internet by mid-October, as the database-software company changes its business model to fit a new competitive landscape. Around 65% of Oracle’s products are available on the cloud today, and that will climb to 95% by the time the company holds its annual Oracle OpenWorld conference in October.
Oracle investors are paid a 1.4% dividend. The consensus price target is $46.28. Shares closed Friday at $43.08.
Emerson Electric
Emerson Electric trades at 15.6 times fiscal 2015 estimated earnings and also has an outstanding 6.97 free cash flow yield. The company is a global leader in bringing technology and engineering together to provide innovative solutions for customers in industrial, commercial and consumer markets around the world. It is composed of five business segments: Process Management, Industrial Automation, Network Power, Climate Technologies, and Commercial & Residential Solutions.
Emerson Process Management recently completed automating a new 800-megawatt, supercritical thermal power-generating unit owned by APPDCL, a special purpose entity of APGENCO, the Andhra Pradesh state government power generation utility. This is the first state-owned supercritical power station being built in India.
Emerson investors are paid an outstanding 3.3% dividend. The consensus price target is posted at $61.39. Shares ended last week at $57.65.
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Tech companies often post solid free cash flow as they usually have very low or no corporate debt to pay interest on. All five of these stocks provide growth stock investors with positive dividends and growth potential, while having outstanding free cash flow yields.
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