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Conservative Income Feature

Avangrid Inc: Getting Back on the Road to Growth

By Roger S. Conrad on Nov. 9, 2020

Conservative Holding Avangrid Inc (NYSE: AGR) hasn’t raised its dividend since July 2018. Not surprisingly, its returns have since lagged the Dow Jones Utility Average by more than 25 percentage points.

Two major developments in the past month promise a favorable reversal of fortune, even as shares have dropped roughly 10 percent to an attractive entry point.

CMS Energy: Renewables Growth with Takeover Upside

By Roger S. Conrad on Oct. 12, 2020

“Keep it simple” is a best practices business maxim that’s far easier to preach than practice. But when a company consistently sticks to it, superior results follow—as they have for nearly 20 years at Michigan electric and gas utility CMS Energy (NYSE: CMS).

Essential Utilities: Still Building Real Wealth

By Roger S. Conrad on Sep. 8, 2020

Barely a century ago, Americans enjoyed plentiful, clean and practically free drinking water. Now ensuring safe supplies and treating waste is an increasingly essential and rapidly growing $200 billion plus global market. Among the surest beneficiaries: The handful of US investor owned utilities, headlined by Conservative Holding Essential Utilities (NYSE: WTRG).

Southern Company: High Quality at a Soon to Vanish Discount

By Roger S. Conrad on Aug. 10, 2020

In the May 23 Utility Roundup, I highlighted Southern Company’s (NYSE: SO) “secret weapon” in its odyssey to bring new nuclear construction over the finish line at the Vogtle site in Georgia: Observation of the startup and two years of operations at four facilities in China, built on the same AP1000 reactor model.

Duke Energy: Rid of ACP, Focused on Renewables

By Roger S. Conrad on Jul. 10, 2020

Electric utilities measure life of key assets in decades, rather than months or years. Success not only requires making the right call on what in invest in, but being flexible enough to shift course when circumstances change.

Duke Energy (NYSE: DUK) has demonstrated both this month, shelving its Atlantic Coast Pipeline project with Dominion Energy (NYSE: D). The company’s natural gas power plants will be in business for a while, enabling retirement of 6.5 gigawatts of coal capacity since 2010. The utility plans to retire 900 megawatts more by 2025, while shortening lives of 7.7 GW in North Carolina and Indiana.

Sempra Energy: Multiple Reliable Growth Drivers

By Roger S. Conrad on Jun. 9, 2020

Conservative Holding Sempra Energy (NYSE: SRE) has traded as high as $162 and as low as $88 this year. That volatility contrasts sharply with the steady business performance of the diversified utility and midstream energy company, including the robust 8 percent dividend boost this spring.

Dominion Energy: Rate Basing Renewables for Growth

By Roger S. Conrad on May. 11, 2020

The customer is always right regardless of what business you’re in. And for regulated energy utilities like Dominion Energy (NYSE: D) now, that means using more wind and solar to generate electricity.

TC Energy: Steady Growth in a Stricken Sector

By on Apr. 13, 2020

It’s one thing to grow when your industry is booming. It’s another entirely when almost every company is crawling into its shell, if management still has one—but that’s exactly what TC Energy (TSX: TRP, NYSE: TRP) is doing with sub-$5 oil prices in some regions it serves.

Verizon Communications: Steady Growth at the Top of Telecom

By Roger S. Conrad on Mar. 10, 2020

Verizon Communications (NYSE: VZ) expects its revenue growth to accelerate to “mid single digits” in 2020 from last year’s 0.8 percent. That’s based on three drivers.

First is continuing Q4’s favorable trends in wireless and broadband customer additions. The second is accelerating growth in business revenue, as advanced services adoption speeds up with 5-G. And the third is stabilized media services sales, following recent streamlining.

Comcast Corp: Business Model on Target

By Roger S. Conrad on Feb. 10, 2020

Intense competition, hefty capital spending needs and erratic regulation have made the communications sector an investment minefield. But Conservative Holding Comcast Corp (NSDQ: CMCSA) remains a model of consistency, adding new business while growing cash flow and dividends.

MODEL PORTFOLIOS & RATINGS

ABOUT ROGER CONRAD

Roger S. Conrad needs no introduction to individual and professional investors, many of whom have profited from his decades of experience uncovering the best dividend-paying stocks for accumulating sustainable wealth. Roger b