The Oracle of Omaha has set his sights on Chevron and Verizon.
Berkshire Hathaway, led by famed investor Warren Buffett, announced sizeable stakes in those two legacy players earlier this week.
CNBC’s “Trading Nation” asked two traders whether they would follow his lead and put money to work in those two stocks.
“It speaks to the challenge Buffett has right now in deploying capital. It’s such a massive amount that he has to deploy, so he has to really find these big stable names. … They’re not the typical American franchise buys you would see him make,” Quint Tatro, president of Joule Financial, said Wednesday.
Tatro said while Verizon looks somewhat attractive as a dividend play, he prefers oil giant Chevron.
“This is a major integrated oil name, one of the best balance sheet-type names, 25% debt to equity, which is really, really good in that space,” he said. “Not his typical type of names, but we would probably favor the Chevron over the Verizon.”
Berkshire Hathaway announced an $8.6 billion stake in Verizon and $4.1 billion stake in Chevron. Both have outperformed the market this week.
Todd Gordon, founder of TradingAnalysis.com, holds Chevron and Verizon, pointing out that both are high yielders. Verizon has a dividend yield of 4.4% and Chevron close to 5.5%.
Chevron, in particular, is getting a boost from higher oil prices driven by increased demand and an energy squeeze in Texas during a winter storm. The stock is up more than 12% this month, while crude has surged 17%. Gordon lays out a trade on the stock.
“If you want to do an option spread, here’s a little idea … maybe do a 95-105 call spread if you want to do it that way into June as markets are discounting the summer driving season and the reopening,” he said.
A $105 target implies 10% upside for Chevron from its current levels.
Disclosure: Gordon holds CVX and VZ in his value portfolio.
