Buying dividend stocks that are trading at low earnings multiples can set investors up to earn recurring income while also potentially benefiting from capital gains in the future. While undervalued stocks can sometimes be value traps, that isn't the case with these quality investments.
Novartis (NVS 0.72%), Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce (CM -0.29%), and Intel (INTC 1.77%) are solid stocks with great yields to consider buying right now.
1. Novartis
Swiss drugmaker Novartis is a top healthcare company that has generated close to $7 billion in sales this year just from two products alone -- Cosentyx and Entresto. And with $24.3 billion in revenue during the first nine months of the year, the company isn't overly dependent on those products. Good diversification is part of the reason the stock makes for a solid dividend investment.
Currently, Novartis pays a yield of 3.7%, which is two full points higher than the S&P 500 average of 1.7%. What's encouraging is that even with such a high yield, the healthcare stock's payout ratio remains modest at just 34% of earnings. This means that Novartis has room to increase its dividend in the future, something that it has been doing for 25 years in a row.
Novartis is also an attractive investment to buy and hold because the company is forecasting some modest and consistent growth. Through 2026, it's projecting that its sales will rise by 4% annually as it counts on 20-plus products that have the potential to be blockbusters (generating peak revenue of at least $1 billion).
Trading at just 9 times earnings, the stock is an incredibly cheap buy given the attractive growth and dividend income it offers investors; the average S&P 500 stock trades at a multiple of 19. Novartis is also the only stock on this list that has generated positive gains this year as its shares are up around 3%.
2. Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce
Dividend-hungry investors can collect an even better yield from the Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce (CIBC), whose stock pays 6.2% annually. That's a remarkably high payout for a bank stock. And considering that CIBC is a top chartered bank in Canada, there isn't a whole lot of risk here.
At around 50%, the bank's payout ratio isn't high, and it has been increasing its dividend payments since 2011. But its overall streak of paying dividends goes back more than 150 years to 1868 when it made its first dividend payment. Its price-to-earnings (P/E) multiple of 8 is incredibly low and offers investors terrific value.
While bank stocks could be risky buys heading into a possible recession next year, CIBC's low multiple gives investors a good margin of safety, potentially limiting the downside risk for the stock in the near term. And in the long haul, CIBC is an excellent stock to invest in as the business is highly profitable, generating a strong profit margin of 28% over the trailing 12 months.
3. Intel
Tech stock and chipmaker Intel is another high-yielding investment that can make for a solid buy right now. Investors are wary of the company's efforts to build out its foundry business as that will come with added costs and could put pressure on the dividend. Earlier this year, the company announced it would be committing $36 billion to produce chips in Europe and that its investment will increase to more than double that over the course of a decade.
Given the strong need for capital, Intel is arguably the riskiest dividend stock on this list. But its payout ratio of 45% remains modest. Concerned investors, however, will point to the company's negative free cash flow of $13.3 billion over the past 12 months as a problem.
But during that time, the company's changes in working capital (e.g., changes in receivables and inventory) resulted in an outflow of more than $10 billion. Those are items that can and will fluctuate over the course of business, and that means those outflows could eventually turn into inflows.
Plus, with $22.6 billion in cash and short-term investments on its books (as of the end of September), the company has strong financial resources to help fund its growth and to help buy time for the cash flow situation to improve. Intel's dividend costs the company approximately $1.5 billion each quarter.
Strong demand in the chip market and Intel reporting solid operating profits of around 12% should give investors confidence in the business in the long run. Management also increased the dividend by 5% earlier this year -- a move that likely wouldn't have happened if the company had been concerned about the safety of its payouts.
Intel is a bit of a contrarian investment, but with a yield of 5.4% and a P/E of only eight, it could be an underrated dividend stock to buy right now.
