gosh137
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You, me and everyone else in the world use hand soap, toothpaste, laundry soap, dish soap, shampoo etc every day. We use it up quickly and need to buy more. Who are the manufacturers/distributors of such products? Proctor & Gamble not only has made money for many years, but they have made enough to be able to raise their dividend each year for the past 50 years. Other makers - Colgate Palmolive, Unilever, Dial, Clorox. I would hold off on big banks until the sub prime mortgage mess gets overwith. There are 2 smaller regional banks (not very involved with the sub prime mess) that I like. Regions Financial (best bank management in the business, grows by taking over other regional banks and increasing efficiency) and New York Community Bancorp. Electric utilities - some are good, some are in states with very hard state regulators. Stay away from Illinois. Southern Co., MDU Resources, and Duke are very good imo. Low risk is natural gas pipeline companies like Piedmont Natural Gas, Atmos Energy, WGL Holdings, Questar (symbol STR, a Utah gas utility plus gas exploration/production/pipeline company). Railroads are also low risk, low enough for Warren Buffet to like them. 3M corporation makes post it notes and thousands of other products they sell all over the world. They are also increasing their Research and Development spending. I don't think they will be in any trouble for awhile (unlike high risk General Motors someone else mentioned). I don't like Pfizer any more, it's pipeline is not nearly as good as in years past. |
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lithium630
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Just diversify your portfolio with good stocks and you should do fine. I have Wal-Mart (WMT), Pfizer (PFE), Motorola (MOT), and PrimeWest (PWI). I'm looking for one more right now. All these are in different sectors. |
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Menehune
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Utilities are probably the safest. It is hard to imagine some of them going bankrupt unless the whole country collapsed.
I would put TVC (Tennessee Valley) at the top of the list. EXC (Excelon), SO (Southern Power), DUK (Duke Power), and GAS (NICOR) are very solid, pay good dividends, and have been increasing in value. |
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Yardbird
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Muncie is right that a mutual fund is probably your best bet. Some safe mutual funds include OAKBX or VIVAX or VGTSX or VTSMX
But if you're set on stocks, consider NVS, Novartis, a big drug company poised for an upturn. People need drugs even when the economy tanks. |
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sdwhitworth_2000
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Big bank stocks: Bank of America, Wells Fargo, Washington Mutual, etc... they also pay very nice dividends. |
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Tom H
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There are some good answers here already. But I would add that there is not any good stock out there that might not go down in value significantly over the short term (6 months).
I would agree that both BofA (BAC) and Citi (C) are good investments (I own them); but they might go down very substantially over the fears of the sub-prime mortgage mess. You can own them, but don't panic if they go down!
One of the lessons you can learn from Warren Buffett and Jeremy Siegel is that brand name consumer companies like Coke, Proctor, Sees Candies, Wrigley gum, etc. are killer investments for the long haul.
I've done some analysis of the fundamentals of these sorts of companies, and I think one of the better ones is Pepsi (PEP). They've got a great new CEO, improved product diversification, good growth, and a commitment to increase their dividend over time. |
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walt17jr
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BAC & DUK Both have good dividend.
KR a dependable way to diversify
PFE or SGP PFE has the best dividend.
SLB or XOM
MMM
AEO instead of MMM if you want to add a touch of risk. This stock is down but I expect it to go up significantly in the next year.
Be sure to diversify!
I own: BAC, DUK, KR, AEO
Considering the others as possible buys. |
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Frank Castle
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Exxon Mobil, Royal Dutch Shell, Citigroup, BP and Bank of America (In that order) |
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muncie birder
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If you want low risk, then what you want are not 5 low risk stocks but either an index fund or a mutual fund. Why? Because with just 5 stocks your portfolio is subject to specific risk. If just 1 of those 5 goes south on you you are going to take at least a 10% hit and possibly a 20% hit. There are mutual funds that invest in less risky stocks. From your avitar name it appears you might be from India so I am going to link you to a site that rates Indian mutual funds.
http://www.valueresearchonline.com/funds/default.asp |
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Thin Kaboudit
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Pick any five from the Dow Jones 30.
You'll get the best return by buying the "Small Dogs of the Dow", the five cheapest/highest dividend ratio components out of the 30 stocks that make up the Index, currently AT&T, Verizon, General Motors, Pfizer and General Electric. |
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