Whirlpool's cash crunch is now severe enough that it is suspending its dividend until further notice, per the WSJ, after paying through 10 US recessions and every crisis since the 1950s. Its chart has formed a secular death cross for the first time in decades, a break from past recessions. x.com 

Procter & Gamble's steadily rising dividend shows why boring pays through downturns. It raised its dividend for the 70th straight year in April; the annual payment rose 5.7 times from $0.76 per share in 2001 to $4.36 today, about 7.2% a year through the dot-com crash, 2008, Covid and 2022. It returned $3.9 billion to shareholders in one quarter, while semiconductors are 27% below their high. x.com 

Whirlpool trades as if the economy were in a depression like 1929 or 2008, at about 14 times earnings, despite very good product quality. On the technical side it is weekly oversold, shows a weekly bullish divergence and sits further below its 200-week average than ever. It is a hold until at least 2031. x.com 

MGM Resorts' debt and operating leverage make its low free-cash-flow yield risky. A recession would make the situation very bad even if conditions otherwise look fine, and Diller is following the Liberty levered-buyback model. x.com  x.com  x.com 

Whirlpool will find it nearly impossible to succeed until tariffs are lifted, as slowing appliance spending meets its shift to US manufacturing and sales. Once the good cheap brand, it closed international plants after tariffs hit, and its prices are now unrealistic, matched to LG's. Fitch sees it as too leveraged at around BB-, and share sales will soon be needed; it may be a trade, but with far too many dangers. x.com 

Big money is rotating out of overextended chips and AI plays, leaving semiconductor stocks that went straight up as exit liquidity for retail still piling in. The money is moving into software such as Accenture, Salesforce and ServiceNow, energy names Hawaiian Electric and Southern Company, and boring dividend stocks Whirlpool, Target and UPS. It is also flowing into China: Alibaba, JD.com, PDD, Baidu and Chinese internet stocks. x.com  x.com 

Hershey is a better consumer-staples bet than optically cheaper peers because its strong brand and balance sheet keep it out of dividend-cut risk. @CDInewsletter notes Campbell's just cut its dividend and expects General Mills to follow, as both are too levered, and argues a CPG turnaround bet should be limited to companies with excellent balance sheets. x.com 

Nike might not bottom until it cuts or eliminates its dividend, since net income is down 75% over five years and it cannot afford the payout. This could be one of the hardest turnarounds ever: it is getting clobbered on all fronts, China won't be coming back soon, products need a serious makeover and it overpays too many pro athletes. It needs to preserve cash, bring in new people and ideas, and find a way to bring excitement back to the brand. x.com  x.com 

Campbell's outlook is deteriorating. It cut its dividend from 39 cents to 25 cents, lowered guidance and said 2027 looks even worse. x.com 

Dividend growth, not yield, is the only dividend strategy worth following, since high-income strategies are mainly marketing and dividends are an inefficient form of compounding. Favor high-quality companies with solid balance sheets that raise dividends every year, such as Cintas, Casey's, Givaudan, S&P Global and L'Oréal. Dividend growth strategies have delivered superior returns to high-dividend ones, with considerably lower drawdowns in stress periods such as the March 2020 Covid shock. … Show more