Top Stocks for March 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 8.1% over the past 12 months. This market performance number and all data below are as of Feb. 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.
• 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. On Feb. 15, the company announced that Christine S. Breves, senior vice president and chief financial officer (CFO) intends to leave the company in 2022. Breves will continue to serve as CFO while the company conducts a search for a permanent replacement.
• 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. 
• eBay Inc.: eBay is an e-commerce company offering platforms to connect global buyers and sellers across more than 190 markets around the world. The company has roughly 1.5 billion active listings and 147 million active buyers worldwide. eBay’s Q4 2021 ended Dec. 31. For that quarter, the company reported over 133% year-over-year (YOY) growth in net income on a 5.4% increase in net revenues. eBay indicated that growth in its advertising business and focus categories helped to drive performance.
• 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.

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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• EQT Corp.: EQT is an integrated energy company focused on natural gas production in the Appalachian area. The company explores for and produces natural gas and natural gas liquids (NGLs). Its operations are focused in Pennsylvania, West Virginia, and Ohio. The company owns over 1 million net acres across its portfolio. On Feb. 3, EQT announced quarterly cash dividend of $0.125 per share, payable on March 1 to shareholders of record as of Feb. 14, 2022.
• Upstart Holdings Inc.: Upstart Holdings is a lending platform that uses AI to assess the credit worthiness of potential borrowers. Upstart uses machine learning to look at more variables than normal credit-risk assessments, which it says will allow banks to lend to more borrowers with less risk due to the increased accuracy of this method. On Feb. 15, Upstart announced the launch of a share repurchase program in which the company is authorized to purchase up to $400 million of common stock.
• United States Steel Corp.: See company description above.
• Boston Properties Inc.: Boston Properties is a developer, owner, and manager of Class A office properties in Boston, Los Angeles, New York, San Francisco, Seattle, and Washington, DC. The company’s portfolio includes 202 properties representing over 52 million square feet.
• Digital Realty Trust Inc.: Digital Realty Trust is a real estate investment trust (REIT) which owns and manages technology-related properties. The company focuses on data center, colocation and interconnection-related properties. It owns more than 280 data centers in 26 countries. Net income grew more than 18-fold on modest revenue growth YOY for Q4 2021, ended Dec. 31. Record bookings for the quarter helped to drive this performance.

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. Alcoa announced on Feb. 24 a quarterly cash dividend of $0.10 per share of common stock, to be paid on March 24 to stockholders of record as of March 8, 2022.
• 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.
• 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. The company announced in late February that Jim Frias, CFO, Treasurer, and Executive Vice President, will retire effective June 11, 2022, and will transition out of the role as of March 6. Steve Laxton, currently Vice President of Business Development and Strategic Planning, has been named his successor.
• Targa Resources Corp.: Targa Resources is a midstream natural gas and NGL services company. It gathers, compresses, treats, processes, transports, and sells natural gas, NGLs, and crude oil. Targa divides its operations across two segments: Gathering and Processing, and Logistics and Transportation.

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