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With it being the first week of the new month and a New Year in this case I undertook the monthly re-screening of the portfolio having not done any trades on the back of the one in December given the likely thin market conditions and some marginal sales that came up at that time. There were however two natural sales this month, the first of which was the insurance broker Jardine Lloyd Thomson (JTL) which had only entered the portfolio at the end of  October on the back of some upgrades. This time around the score had deteriorated to 69 as the previous upgrades seemed to have been reversed. This was now well below the 75 to 80 sale threshold that I normally use, having been just around it in December. Thus it was a natural sale on the process and therefore booked a small profit of around 6% on this as the share price had risen despite the downgrades. Personally I felt indifferent about it too as it is on close to 20x with a 2.6% yield and only had fairly modest dividend growth forecasts of 5.3% in the current year.

This was replaced with another financial in the shape of Miton Group (MGR) the small (£64m Market Cap.) fund management company, although the emerging market specialist City of London Group (CLIG) ran it a close second as it seems pretty stable, good value and emerging markets still seem relatively cheap. I did also debate this with myself as the portfolio already has a fund manager and a broking company, but hey we are in a bull market and global economies seem set fair so I let it go in as the highest scoring qualifying candidate after applying my value constraints. The other attraction with Miton, in contrast to JLT, was that it had already said they were going to beat forecasts and had upgrades accordingly. Despite this and a rise in the price post the announcement it seems to have drifted back since (on profit taking presumably), so it also seemed to be offering an attractive entry point. It also offers reasonable valuation characteristics of a PE under 12x and a yield of close to 4% based on next years (December 2018) forecasts which suggest dividend growth of 27% after this years forecast 10%. That does seem like quite a jump so maybe this years dividend could be better than expected as analysts often upgrade earnings but fail to adjust their dividend forecasts, plus they have a cash rich balance sheet too. Finally also worth noting that they only seem to pay the dividend once a year in May with an XD in March - so another reason why this may be an opportune moment to pick some up. However, given the small market cap. it may not be that liquid, but in the interests of full disclosure I have managed to buy some myself having booked a decent trading profit on some Polar Capital (POLR) that I picked up towards the end of last year after they had strong upgrades.

The second natural sale based on a decline in its score, also primarily on downgrades, was the expensive, quality, defensive(?) stock Diageo (DGE) where the score had fallen to 73 making it much more of a marginal call. The valuation is looking stretched though as the share price momentum it has displayed has left it with a PE of 22.2x, a yield of 2.55% and an earnings yield of less than 5%. So I decided to follow the process rather than my own feelings as personally I continue to hold it as part of a broader diversified income portfolio.

A couple of similar or defensive type stocks which came up as possible replacements were Stock Spirits (STCK) and AB Foods (ABF). Neither of these seemed particularly cheap either so in the end I replaced it with a much cheaper, but more cyclical company which scores highly. This was the equipment rental firm VP which trades on a sub 10x PE with a yield of 3.2% with dividend growth forecast to be 15% and a good track record on that front too. It had also seen upgrades recently on the back of an upbeat trading statement, although the shares had also drifted back a bit recently too. It does feel a bit like I'm coming late to this particular party, but then that's what following a quantitative process does, makes you take what feel like uncomfortable decisions. In this case I can probably rationalize it given the valuation and the strongish economic background generally.

Other candidates in a similar space were Ashtead (AHT), dismissed because it yielded under 2% and Somero (SOM) which was sold back in August for the portfolio, but which I picked up myself toward the end of last year. It looks pretty solid (pun intended) assuming they can deliver the promised second half recovery from poor weather related trading in H1. It didn't score as well as or look such good value as VP on a PE and yield basis, although it does offer a more attractive looking earnings yield, but personally I can see the attractions and they could also be a beneficiary of the recently proposed US tax changes.

So there ends the update on the trades & other ideas from the Compound Income Scores Portfolio monthly screening and don't forget if you would like to identify more opportunities like these yourself by using the Compound Income Scores as part of your investment research process too, then you can read more about them and gain access to them for the equivalent of just £1 a week by clicking here or on the Scores menu in the navigation menu toward the top of the site or the three bars if you are on a mobile / tablet. Here's to a Happy and Prosperous New Year.

Lots of people are worrying about "the market" being expensive these days, which in the US may be true to a certain extent. In the UK however, this may not be so true as we struggle with BREXIT & a generally downbeat economic outlook post the budget. This may not be such a bad thing though as there has been research in the past showing that equities in countries with low GDP growth tended to outperform those in countries that high GDP growth rates.

Any way lets look at the evidence of the valuations attached to UK Equities. According to Stockopedia the FTSE 100 index for example has a Median trailing PE of 17.8x with a forecast PE of 15.3x, which is not far off the long term average. This is and based on forecast earnings growth of just under 10%. Looking at the yield side of the valuation on the FTSE 100 Index this shows a trailing yield of 2.9% and 3.3% forecast, which must therefore be factoring in similar or slightly higher rates of growth to the earning growth forecasts. That headline yield of around 3% does compare favourably with what you can get on Gilts and on cash in the bank. Given the forecast growth it should also protect your income from the current 3% inflation too in the short run and in the long run too I would argue.

It is worth remembering not so long ago before Central Banks really got going with manipulating interest rates, there was something called the reverse yield gap. That was the gap between equity yields and government bonds where equities yielded less (yes less that's not a typo) but these days as the old chines curse says - we live in interesting times.

Now the other interesting fact when looking at the FTSE and looking at the highest yielders is that there are 25 or a quarter of the index yielding more than 5%. Thus it should be possible to put together a diversified portfolio of say 20 FTSE stocks with an average yield of 6% if you equally weighted them. You could take your pick form the list below although the growth on offer is lower than the headline figure suggested above and the cover is quite low in a number of cases, so dividend cuts could be possible in a number of these.

Despite this though some such as Centrica (CNA) and Glaxo SmithKline (GSK) have indicated that they are prepared to run with low levels of cover and maintain their payouts. Indeed GSK is currently toward the bottom of its 5 year range (see graph at the end) and therefore may be offering an attractive entry point. Whether these yields prove to be sustainable in the long run though remains to be seen, especially if GSK should finally decide to split the business up. Meanwhile in a similar fashion on SSE,  I suspect their proposed merger of their distribution business may well lead to a lower total distribution from the split business, if it does go ahead down the line. Like GSK  though they are also trading toward the bottom of their 5 year range too (see graph at the end). I'll leave you to decide if you think that's a good entry point or not.

Any way just goes to show you can get quite a lot of value in the market at the moment, although I wouldn't necessarily suggest rushing out and buying all the names below as they are a bit of a mixed bag in terms of their scores on the Compound Income Scores, but as part of a diversified income portfolio some of them could do a good job for you.

As ever you should always do your own research and pay your money and take your choice or not as the case may be. Good luck with your investing and don't forget you can get this kind of information and more to help you identify good value, growing, quality  yield stocks if you sign up for the Compound Income Scores. These are now available via Dropbox, Microsoft One Drive as well as Google drive / docs. Alternatively if you would prefer to receive them via e-mail in a spreadsheet of pdf form then please do get in touch & I'm sure we might be able to arrange that too.

A quick update on the two growing small cap stocks I featured recently. Firstly on Taptica (TAP), where I was wrong to say that there probably wasn't enough in the numbers for the shares to challenge their previous high in the short term. Well they have only gone and done it just to prove me wrong. I don't think however it would be a good idea to chase them up here as I note that the finance director sold 200,000 shares on 5th October 2017 at 445p & now holds only only 94,572, although I suspect he's probably got a few options no doubt. Of course I could be wrong again as stocks around 12 month highs can go onto perform well as investors (and maybe even the FD here) make behavioural mistakes by anchoring on the previous high price, although the shares are off this morning. It does however continue to score well in the Compound Income Scores (CIS) and as such is probably still worth sticking with despite the directors sale as these tend not to be as instructive as directors purchases.

Meanwhile on S & U (SUS) I note that the shares have managed to sneak up into their previous range between about 2000p and 2500p and sustained it for now. So some modest encouragement there despite the on going weaker new car sales, although that is not so relevant to them as they deal in loans for second hand cars. I note too that there have been some modest upgrades to forecast post the results which is a good sign, so some encouragement there too. Talking of upgrades there was also a good, detailed, sponsored (?) note from Edison which also included some upgrades and in which they maintained a valuation at 2,700p per share suggesting significant upside from the current share price.

If that is of interest to you I attach a copy below. On that basis and given my long standing holdings in this one I'm happy to continue holding it even though the CIS is only average on this one right now.

That just leaves me to wish you happy and safe investing and hope you have a great weekend whatever you are up to.

XL Media (XLM) - the Israeli, Aim Listed on line performance marketing company has announced interim results today. These look pretty strong with revenues up by 33% driven by a similar level of organic growth in their highly profitable publishing division which makes up 44% of their business.  This helped to make up for slower organic growth and lower margins in their media business & a fall of 25% in turnover from their partner networks operations which make up the remaining 56% (50% & 6% respectively) of the business. They also completed some acquisitions in financial & cyber security verticals in the US and in the mobile gaming area which helped to boost revenues in the media business.

The dividend was increased by 5%, which is a bit better than the marginal growth that is reflected in current consensus forecasts, so these could be upgraded if analysts bother to note that. More interestingly in the Outlook and headlines where they said: "The Board is therefore confident of comfortably meeting profit expectations for the full year..." which I take to mean they think they will probably easily beat current forecasts of 14c per share. This looks likely as even if the 2nd half was flat, then by my calculations, they would still come close to 14c. Thus there may be scope for some upgrades here if analysts share my opinion, but maybe the Company will steer them to keeping unchanged numbers so they can beat them later in the year? There will be a webcast of the results presentation which will be available on their website later today at: http://www.xlmedia.com/media/.

So overall a decent looking set of numbers which leaves the potential for some upgrades or a beat of full year numbers if upgrades don't come through in the short term. Of course being an Israeli company listed on AIM with a somewhat opaque business model, this is not one for everyone and indeed maybe one that the market loves to hate. Despite that it does have good financial metrics and has delivered growth of over 20% per annum in eps since 2011, although this may not be sustainable at this rate as they seem to be needing to make acquisitions now to keep the growth going which is potentially more risky. This new phase may well have been highlighted by big holders selling down in the last year or so, although I note the CEO still has a decent stake in the business. Given all that the quantitative scoring systems such as Stockopedia & our own Compound Income Scores continue to rate it highly at 97 & 98 respectively. So on about 12x with a 4.5% growing yield it will remain the CIS Portfolio and might be worthy of further investigation if you are not put off by the nature of it or think that the market will continue to love to hate it.