Top Stocks for February 2022

The Russell 1000 Index is a market-capitalization-weighted index of the 1,000 largest publicly traded companies in the U.S. It represents approximately 92% of the total market capitalization (market cap) of all listed stocks in the U.S. equity market. For this reason, it is considered a bellwether for large-cap investing. Some of the largest companies in the index include Apple Inc. (AAPL), Johnson & Johnson (JNJ), and The Walt Disney Co. (DIS).

The Russell 1000 provided a total return of 11.7% over the past 12 months. This market performance number and all data below are as of Jan. 25, 2022.

Here are the top five stocks across all sectors with the best value, the fastest growth, and the most momentum.

Value investing is a factor-based investing strategy that involves picking stocks that you believe are trading for less than what they are intrinsically worth, usually by measuring the ratio of the stock’s price to one or more fundamental business metrics. A widely accepted value metric is the price-to-earnings (P/E) ratio. Value investors believe that if a business is cheap compared to its intrinsic value (as measured by its P/E ratio, in this case), then the stock price may rise faster than that of others as the price comes back in line with the worth of the company. These are among the stocks with the lowest 12-month trailing P/E ratio:

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• UWM Holdings Corp.: UWM Holdings operates as a wholesale mortgage lender. The company originates, sells, and services residential mortgage loans, including government loans, across the United States. UWM employs 8,600 people. UWM announced in November financial results for Q3 of its 2021 fiscal year (FY), the three-month period ended Sept. 30, 2021. Net income fell 77.3% compared to the year-ago quarter as revenue sank 62.4%. The company said that its net income was impacted by a $170.5 million decline in the fair value of mortgage servicing rights.
• United States Steel Corp.: United States Steel is a steel producer with operations in the U.S. and Central Europe. The company makes high value-added steel products, including its proprietary XG3 advanced high-strength steel. It serves the automotive, construction, appliance, energy, containers, and packaging industries. U.S. Steel has an annual raw steelmaking capability of 26.2 million net tons.
• Bio-Rad Laboratories Inc.: Bio-Rad Laboratories develops and manufactures a wide array of products for the life science research and clinical diagnostic markets. Its customers include university and research institutions, hospitals, biotechnology and pharmaceutical companies, and applied laboratories. The company operates globally and employs roughly 7,800 people worldwide.
• Qurate Retail Inc.: Qurate Retail is an e-commerce services company that reaches 218 million homes worldwide and operates through seven retail brands: QVC, HSN, Zulily, Frontgate, Ballard Designs, Garnet Hill, and Grandin Road. It partners with television networks, e-commerce sites, streaming services, social pages, mobile apps, and print catalogs to provide video and digital commerce services. 
• Sage Therapeutics Inc.: Sage Therapeutics is a biopharmaceutical company that develops novel therapies for people with debilitating brain disorders. The company targets diseases and disorders of the brain within key areas such as depression, neurology, and neuropsychiatry. It markets Zulresso, a drug for treating postpartum depression, and has a number of drugs in its development pipeline. At the J.P. Morgan Healthcare Conference on Jan. 11, 2022, the company detailed research and clinical findings concerning its investigational drug Zuranolone. Sage said that Zuranolone had demonstrated rapid improvement in depressive symptoms. That included a 40%-to-60% improvement in health domains, including mental health, vitality, and social functioning.

These are the top stocks as ranked by a growth model that scores companies based on a 50/50 weighting of their most recent quarterly YOY percentage revenue growth and their most recent quarterly YOY earnings per share (EPS) growth. Both sales and earnings are critical factors in the success of a company. Therefore, ranking companies by only one growth metric makes a ranking susceptible to the accounting anomalies of that quarter (such as changes in tax law or restructuring costs) that may make one or the other figure unrepresentative of the business in general. Companies with quarterly EPS or revenue growth of more than 2,500% were excluded as outliers.

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• LyondellBasell Industries NV: LyondellBasell Industries is a Netherlands-based multinational plastics, chemicals, and refining company. The company produces a range of chemicals, polymers, and fuels. It is also the largest licensor of polyolefin technologies and the largest producer of polypropylene compounds. LyondellBasell’s products are sold in more than 100 countries. The company announced in mid-December that it has appointed Peter Vanacker as its new chief executive officer (CEO). Vanacker, who previously served as president and CEO of Neste Corp., replaces Bhavesh V. Patel.
• Nucor Corp.: Nucor is a manufacturer of steel and steel products, with operating facilities throughout North America. The company makes a broad range of carbon and alloy steel products, including bars, beams, sheet, electrical conduits, precision castings, steel fasteners, insulated metal panels, steel grating, and more. It also sells both ferrous and nonferrous metals. Nucor announced in early December that its board of directors has increased the company’s regular quarterly cash dividend on common stock by 23% to $0.50 per share. The dividend is payable on Feb. 11, 2022 to stockholders of record as of Dec. 31, 2021.
• Steel Dynamics Inc.: Steel Dynamics is a steel producer and metals recycler with operation facilities throughout the U.S. and Mexico. The company produces hot roll, cold roll, and coated sheet steel, as well as structural steel beams and shapes, cold finished steel, merchant bar products, steel joists, and other products. It also produces liquid pig iron and processes ferrous and nonferrous scrap. Steel Dynamics has steelmaking and coating capacity of roughly 13 million tons as of Dec. 31, 2020.
• Nielsen Holdings PLC: Nielsen Holdings is a global data and analytics company that focuses on the media industry. The company offers audience measurement, audience outcomes, content, and other analytics to customers in 55 countries. It specializes in offering cross-media audience measurement that has gone through the process of data deduplication, a technique for eliminating copies of repeating data.
• Westlake Chemical Corp.: Westlake Chemical is a global maker and supplier of petrochemicals, vinyls, polymers, and building products. Its products are used in infrastructure materials, packaging, healthcare products, automotive, and consumer goods. The company employs roughly 14,700 employees and operates worldwide. Westlake Chemical announced in late November that it has agreed to acquire the Netherlands-based global epoxy business of Hexion Inc. for approximately $1.2 billion. Hexion’s epoxy business manufactures specialty resins, coatings, and composites for a range of industries. The transaction is expected to close during the first half of 2022.

Momentum investing is a factor-based investing strategy that involves investing in a stock whose price has risen faster than the market as a whole. Momentum investors believe that stocks that have outperformed the market will often continue to do so because the factors that caused them to outperform will not suddenly disappear. In addition, other investors seeking to benefit from the stock’s outperformance will often purchase the stock, further bidding its price higher and pushing the stock higher still. These are the stocks that had the highest total return over the past 12 months.

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• Alcoa Corp.: Alcoa is a leading producer of aluminum, bauxite, and alumina products. The company serves customers in the aluminum industry around the world. Alcoa has access to bauxite reserves at seven global mines and a portfolio of seven alumina refineries. Its aluminum operations include smelting and casting to create aluminum products such as billet, foundry, rod, and slab. Alcoa also owns various select energy assets.
• Devon Energy Corp.: Devon Energy is an independent oil and natural gas exploration and production company. It owns a portfolio of U.S. assets and is primarily engaged in the exploration, development, and production of oil, natural gas, and natural gas liquids (NGLs). The company employed 1,400 people across the U.S. as of Dec. 31, 2020.
• Continental Resources Inc.: Continental Resources is an oil and natural gas exploration and production company. It is the largest leaseholder and among the largest producers in the Bakken oil field region of North Dakota and Montana. The company also has positions in Oklahoma, Wyoming, and Texas. The company employed 1,201 people throughout the U.S., as of Dec. 31, 2020. Continental Resources recently announced that it has named Doug Lawler as chief operating officer (COO) and executive vice president, effective Feb. 1, 2022. Lawler, who most recently served as president and CEO of Chesapeake Energy Corp. (CHK) from 2013 to 2021, will take over the COO position from President and COO Jack Stark, who will retire in spring 2022. Bill Berry will assume the role of president in addition to his current role of CEO.
• Marathon Oil Corp.: Marathon Oil is an independent energy company focused on the exploration and production of oil and gas. It produces and markets crude oil and condensate, natural gas, and NGLs. The company’s operations are located in four of the major resource plays in the U.S.—Eagle Ford, Bakken, STACK/SCOOP, and Permian—as well as operations in Equatorial Guinea. Marathon Oil employed 1,672 people worldwide, as of Dec. 31, 2020. The company recently announced a fourth quarter dividend of $0.07 per share payable on March 10, 2022 to shareholders of record on Feb. 16, 2022. The dividend represents a $0.01 increase from the dividend declared for the third quarter. Marathon Oil said that it was the fourth consecutive increase to its quarterly base dividend, which has increased by more than 130% over the past year.
• APA Corp.: APA is a holding company that, through its subsidiaries, explores and produces oil and gas. It has operations in the following regions: the U.S., primarily in the Permian Basin, but also the Eagle Ford and Austin Chalk areas of Texas, the Gulf Coast, and the Gulf of Mexico; the U.K., with interests in hundreds of thousands of gross acreage in the North Sea; Egypt, primarily in the Western Desert; and offshore Suriname. The company announced in early November that it has increased its regular cash dividend on its common stock to approximately $0.13 per share from approximately $0.06 per share. The dividend is payable on Feb. 22, 2022 to stockholders of record as of Jan. 21, 2022.

The comments, opinions, and analyses expressed herein are for informational purposes only and should not be considered individual investment advice or recommendations to invest in any security or adopt any investment strategy. Though we believe the information provided herein is reliable, we do not warrant its accuracy or completeness. The views and strategies described in our content may not be suitable for all investors. Because market and economic conditions are subject to rapid change, all comments, opinions, and analyses contained within our content are rendered as of the date of the posting and may change without notice. The material is not intended as a complete analysis of every material fact regarding any country, region, market, industry, investment, or strategy.

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