One Person's Trash Is Another Person's Treasure Portfolio

One Person's Trash Is Another Person's Treasure Portfolio

Last November, I announced my intention to create a portfolio of 10 companies that investors had effectively thrown away and given up on, in the hope of showing that deep-value investing, and contrarian thinking, can actually be a very successful investing method. I dubbed this the "One Person's Trash Is Another Person's Treasure" portfolio and, over a 10-week span, I highlighted companies that I thought fit this bill, and would expect to drastically outperform the benchmark S&P 500 over the coming 12 months. If you're interested in the reasoning behind why I chose these companies, then I encourage you to review my synopsis of each portfolio selection:

Exelon

QLogic

Dendreon

Dell

Staples

Arkansas Best

Arch Coal

Skullcandy

Orange

Xerox

Week's winner

You'll notice this was a slightly "longer" week than usual, and I attribute that to spending some time with family and friends on a still ongoing vacation. However, while I was away, Arch Coal (NYSE: ACI  ) made a strong 6.4% move to the upside from the last time we looked at it. Two factors seem to be playing a big role in its run higher, including better-than-expected earnings results from coal miner Peabody Energy, as well as Arch's reaffirmation that it would continue to pay a quarterly dividend of $0.03. My thinking here is, "Why would Arch Coal pay a quarterly stipend if it was concerned about its cash flow?" Investors see this as a sign of confidence on Arch's part and gobbled up shares over the past week.

Week's loser

With the markets trending generally higher over the past week and change, there were too many big moves to the downside. But if there must be a loser, biotechnology firm Dendreon (NASDAQ: DNDN  ) will take the crown with a 2.6% retracement. Although no company-specific news has been announced since it received a positive opinion with regard to Provenge in the EU from its panel, investors could be reacting to the reality that another loss is on the way this quarter and even a European approval for Provenge wouldn't spell immediate relief for the struggling Dendreon.