美国股民有望迎来分红旺季

    上周，苹果公司（Apple）公布了最新季报，最令人惊讶的并不是它的业绩再度远超华尔街预期。这家公司如日中天，几乎就被认定了肯定会超预期——唯一的问题是超出幅度是多少。相比之下，更令人瞠目的是这家公司的账簿上居然有高达976亿美元的现金和可售证券。近几年来，我们已经看到了不少报道称美国公司资产负债表上的闲置资金正在不断累积，但这次的情况完全不同。当然，苹果公司的股东们这些年来确实没有多少可以抱怨的——过去五年该股涨了424%，同期标准普尔500指数（S&P500）却下跌了7.4%。但拜托，苹果公司。如果你想不出怎么花这些钱，还是把它还给其真正的主人吧，你又不是对冲基金。

    别忘了，并不是只有苹果公司看上去不知该如何使用近年来积攒下来的大笔现金。高盛（Goldman Sachs）1月24日发布的报告显示，过去四年，高盛跟踪的非金融公司手头现金总额增加了55%，现金/企业价值比率从6%上升到了10%。很多现金都待在海外账户中，因为这些公司都在耐心地等待，希望终有一天美国国会将批准减免对海外收益的征税。（祝他们好运吧！）

    好消息是，高盛认为，一个对“股东更友好”的时代已经来临，由于高管们不敢在充满变数的经济环境中贸然投资，他们终于要开始派发公司坐拥的大堆现金了。仅2012年一年，高盛跟踪的这些公司看来已准备将多达37%的现金用于派息和股票回购，比2002-2010年间的平均水平高出约5个百分点。

    所有这些意味着如果你知道如何选股，就有机会赚上一笔。

    股票回购。2011年，美国上市公司的董事会共核准了约5,300亿美元的股票回购，比2011年高出了45%，是2009年低点的6倍。虽然高盛承认，回购并不总是个股走势强于大盘的可靠指标，2009年3月以来有新回购计划的股票在宣布回购前后，股价走势确实强于标准普尔指数。而且，我们说的这些计划可不是小数目：2011年，华特迪士尼（Walt Disney）宣布了160亿美元的回购计划，摩根大通（JPMorgan Chase）是150亿美元，沃尔玛（Wal-Mart）也是150亿美元。高盛还列出了几家可能很快会宣布或扩大回购计划的公司，包括eBay、辉瑞（Pfizer）和高通（Qualcomm），以及还有大部分回购计划尚未完成的公司，如维亚康姆（Viacom）、Saks百货公司、Abercrombie & Fitch服饰公司和IAC/InterActive Corp媒体公司。

    下面是我看好的公司名单。既然回购计划看来有望支撑公司股价，股民或许可以考虑出售这些公司的看跌期权，落袋为安。因为如果未来股价不下跌，期权价格就会下跌，等到期权到期时，你能拿到的钱少得可怜，什么也干不了。不能说万无一失，但如果公司方面没有什么特别糟糕的利空，如果大盘没有暴跌，这差不多就像是天上掉馅饼。几家候选公司是：有线电视公司Cablevision、哈里伯顿（Halliburton）和美国鹰牌服饰公司（American Eagle Outfitters）。

    When Apple announced its latest quarterly earnings last week, the most amazing thing wasn't that it once again blew away Wall Street's expectations. This company is on a roll of unprecedented proportions, and it's almost assumed that it will exceed expectations -- the only question is by how much. What was far more profound was the revelation of the hoard of $97.6 billion in cash and marketable securities on the company's books. We've been reading for a few years now about corporate America's growing pile of idle balance sheet cash, but this is something else entirely. Apple shareholders don't really have much to complain about these days -- the stock is up 424% over the past five years, compared to a 7.4% decline in the S&P500. But come on, Cupertino. If you can't think of ways to use the money, give it back to its rightful owners. You're not a hedge fund.

    Apple (AAPL), mind you, is not alone in its seeming inability to put the cash it has generated of late to work. According to a January 24 report from Goldman Sachs (GS), non-financial companies the investment bank follows have seen gross cash balances rise by 55% over the past four years, and the ratio of total cash to enterprise value rise from 6% to 10%. Much of that sits in overseas accounts as companies patiently hope for a day when Congress agrees to pass a tax holiday on foreign income. (Good luck with that.)

    But here's the good news: Goldman thinks a more "shareholder friendly" moment is upon us, and that corporate executives are finally going to start doling out the money pile they've been sitting on due to their abject fear of investing in an uncertain economic climate. Companies they follow seem ready to direct a whopping 37% of their cash to dividends and share buybacks alone in the coming year, roughly 500 basis points higher than the average from 2002 to 2010.

    All of this means there's some good money to be made if you know how to pick your spots.

    Stock buybacks. In 2011, some $530 billion of buybacks were authorized by corporate boards, 45% higher than in 2010, and a five-fold increase from the 2009 low. While Goldman admits that buybacks are not always a reliable indicator of stock outperformance, since March 2009, stocks with new repurchase agreements have outperformed the S&P around the announcement of the buybacks. And we're not talking about small numbers, either: In 2011, Walt Disney (DIS) announced a $16 billion buyback, JPMorgan Chase (JPM) a $15 billion one, and Wal-Mart (WMT) another $15 billion. Goldman identifies a handful of companies they think might soon announce or expand repurchase programs, including eBay (EBAY), Pfizer (PFE), and Qualcomm (QCOM). They add another list of companies with big chunks of buybacks yet to be completed, including Viacom (VIA), Saks (SKS), Abercrombie & Fitch (ANF), and IAC/InterActive Corp (IACI).

    Here's my favorite list, though. They compiled a list of companies for which you might consider selling put options because a buyback looks likely to support the company's shares. You pocket the price of the option, and provided the stock doesn't fall and is "put" back to you, you walk away at the option's expiry with a few bucks for pretty much doing nothing at all. No guarantees here, folks, but this is as close to a free lunch as you can get, barring some disastrous news out of a company or a collapse in the overall stock market. A few candidates: Cablevision, Halliburton, and American Eagle Outfitters.