The 52-Week-Low List: 47 Names On Tuesday
A growing list of market lows includes some of the largest names in business, raising questions about value versus damage.
As of Tuesday, September 22, there are 47 US and Canada-listed stocks in the Trefis coverage universe trading at their 52-week lows. The screen only considers companies with a market value above $500 million. The largest company on the list is T-Mobile US (TMUS), with a market value of about $175.7 billion.
This weakness in individual names comes even as the S&P 500 has returned +1.3% over the last month. With 20 of the 47 names also S&P 500 members, the question is what separates these stocks from the index they belong to.
Every Name On The List
The table below lists all 47 US and Canada-listed stocks in the Trefis coverage universe at their 52-week lows (the screen only considers companies with market values above $500 million), largest first, with one-day, one-week, one-month, and one-year returns:
| Tickers | Market Cap |
1D % Chg |
1W % Chg |
1M % Chg |
1Y % Chg |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| TMUS | $175.7 Bil | -1.7% | -10.0% | -10.8% | -30.4% |
| RCL | $63.0 Bil | -6.1% | -5.2% | -19.1% | -26.9% |
| AON | $61.0 Bil | -1.6% | -6.1% | -19.4% | -17.8% |
| SRE | $53.0 Bil | -0.3% | -0.3% | -2.3% | 0.1% |
| LHX | $44.7 Bil | -2.9% | -3.9% | -9.6% | -14.1% |
| PEG | $34.4 Bil | -0.3% | -1.8% | -3.9% | -12.4% |
| CCI | $31.3 Bil | -1.2% | -1.2% | -2.8% | -18.7% |
| PCG | $28.4 Bil | -0.5% | -2.1% | -26.8% | -12.7% |
| ATO | $26.5 Bil | -0.6% | -2.9% | -5.1% | -1.2% |
| LVS | $26.0 Bil | -1.4% | -3.8% | -15.6% | -24.7% |
| FISV | $24.6 Bil | -0.8% | -7.8% | -12.3% | -65.0% |
| NRG | $21.7 Bil | -0.5% | -3.1% | -9.2% | -36.7% |
| FICO | $20.7 Bil | -1.1% | -7.2% | -22.0% | -38.1% |
| STZ | $20.4 Bil | -0.7% | -4.9% | -13.3% | -8.9% |
| CMS | $19.9 Bil | -0.7% | -2.5% | -5.9% | -5.5% |
| NI | $19.1 Bil | -1.6% | -1.7% | -1.8% | 1.6% |
| FIS | $18.0 Bil | -0.7% | -6.4% | -14.5% | -44.3% |
| CHTR | $14.1 Bil | -4.9% | -17.0% | -21.9% | -55.3% |
| TXT | $13.5 Bil | -1.9% | -3.5% | -6.1% | -6.8% |
| TU | $13.5 Bil | -1.2% | -5.5% | -12.1% | -41.2% |
| BWXT | $13.3 Bil | -2.0% | -1.5% | -7.8% | -16.7% |
| PNR | $8.9 Bil | -0.5% | -1.9% | -13.8% | -49.1% |
| SPXC | $8.7 Bil | -3.6% | -2.1% | -15.7% | -7.1% |
| ADC | $8.1 Bil | -0.4% | -3.9% | -8.5% | -1.4% |
| SFD | $7.7 Bil | -1.5% | -2.6% | -12.1% | -14.3% |
| TAP | $6.9 Bil | -1.8% | -6.1% | -13.1% | -17.2% |
| CHDN | $5.6 Bil | -3.0% | -1.4% | -15.2% | -16.3% |
| BYD | $5.4 Bil | -0.7% | -5.3% | -10.5% | -12.6% |
| BROS | $5.2 Bil | -1.0% | -7.7% | -22.3% | -33.9% |
| OGS | $4.6 Bil | -1.0% | -3.6% | -6.7% | 0.3% |
| KRMN | $4.4 Bil | -4.9% | -10.6% | -37.3% | -49.3% |
| FCN | $3.9 Bil | -4.3% | -8.3% | -13.5% | -16.7% |
| PLNT | $3.3 Bil | -9.5% | -16.2% | -21.4% | -57.8% |
| NHI | $3.3 Bil | -0.7% | -2.7% | -8.1% | -10.0% |
| RRR | $2.8 Bil | -3.1% | -9.4% | -19.8% | -17.1% |
| PRVA | $2.5 Bil | -0.4% | -4.4% | -7.9% | -13.0% |
| BXMT | $2.2 Bil | -1.0% | -1.2% | -7.9% | -25.0% |
| STUB | $2.2 Bil | -3.5% | -2.4% | -14.1% | -68.9% |
| ALHC | $1.7 Bil | -4.1% | -23.0% | -39.3% | -51.7% |
| FLO | $1.2 Bil | -1.3% | -4.2% | -13.6% | -51.0% |
| TPB | $1.2 Bil | -1.7% | -13.8% | -27.6% | -40.8% |
| YELP | $1.0 Bil | -2.3% | -10.3% | -19.2% | -40.4% |
| FLNC | $1.0 Bil | -1.6% | -21.8% | -35.9% | -22.3% |
| TRIP | $1.0 Bil | -2.8% | -5.1% | -14.5% | -54.6% |
| LUCK | $0.7 Bil | -2.0% | -3.1% | -21.0% | -42.7% |
| JBGS | $0.6 Bil | -1.8% | -1.1% | -11.9% | -51.4% |
| ARRY | $0.6 Bil | -2.7% | -9.6% | -15.6% | -50.9% |
Is this just price, or is the business broken?
The presence of large, established companies suggests the list is far from being a mere collection of failing businesses. T-Mobile US (TMUS) has seen its stock decline 10.8% over the last month, yet it trades at 16.6 times trailing earnings, and its revenue grew 9.7% over the last twelve months, and its free cash flow yield is 9.2%.
Similarly, Aon (AON), a $61.0 billion company, has declined 19.4% over the last month. But it trades at 15.6 times trailing earnings, and its revenue grew 4.9% over the last twelve months, and its free cash flow yield is 5.3%. In these cases, the stock price is moving opposite to recent business growth.
So how should an investor use this list?
A 52-week-low list is a signal, not a conclusion. A low price can mark a genuinely damaged business whose fundamentals are deteriorating. It can also mark a temporarily out-of-favor business whose price has disconnected from its value.
The disciplined move is to treat the list as a starting point for research. Before the price can be judged as cheap or expensive, the health of the underlying business must be checked.
A 52-week-low list tells you where the pain is; it does not tell you which of these declines are worth buying. That second question is what our Buy the Dip screen answers, every day: beaten-down names where the fundamentals still hold up.
Catching Falling Prices Is A Skill. Not Needing To Is A Strategy
Buying stocks at 52-week lows works brilliantly on the survivors and painfully on the rest, and nobody rings a bell to tell you which is which. The honest answer for most investors is to stop needing that call.
The Trefis High Quality (HQ) Portfolio holds roughly 30 businesses selected for the traits that make recoveries likely in the first place: consistent cash generation, strong margins, resilient balance sheets. It has a track record of outpacing a benchmark that combines the S&P 500, the S&P MidCap 400, and the Russell 2000. Watch the low list for information; let a disciplined basket do the buying.