Still in the Doghouse

This year’s version of the “Dogs of the Dow” has been dogging it again. Of the 10 stocks in the Dow Jones industrial average that began the year with the highest dividend yields, eight are lower as the first half winds down, Bloomberg News notes. It’s not the first time the dogs have failed to live up to the title of “Beating the Dow,” a 1990 book that popularized the investing strategy of buying the 10 highest-yielding shares at the start of each year. They rose less than the Dow industrials and the Standard & Poor’s 500 index in 1998 and 1999. Here’s how the dogs as of Dec. 31 have fared in 2000:

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Ticker Tuesday YTD total Current Company symbol close return* yield Philip Morris MO $25.13 +13.9% 7.6% Exxon Mobil XOM 83.25 +4.5 2.1 SBC Communications SBC 47.19 -2.1 2.1 J.P. Morgan JPM 120.06 -4.4 3.3 Eastman Kodak EK 58.00 -11.1 3.0 General Motors GM 62.06 -13.6 3.2 3M MMM 82.19 -14.9 2.8 Caterpillar CAT 35.06 -25.5 3.9 DuPont DD 45.94 -29.3 3.0 International Paper IP 31.81 -42.9 3.1 Dogs’ average return -12.5 Dow 30 index 10,435.16 -8.6 1.6

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*Price change plus dividend income.

Source: Bloomberg News