Summer is shifting into fall, and winter won’t be far behind, followed by the holidays and the New Year – and already, investors are thinking about finding the best stocks to shape up their portfolios for 2024. Meanwhile, the analysts at Goldman Sachs have been busy curating their ‘top picks’ for the coming year.
Goldman Sachs’ Top Picks give investors a useful pointer toward solid stock choices, but they aren’t the only one. Another comes from the Smart Score, an AI-driven, algorithm-based data collection and collation tool that does the leg-work of gathering, sorting, and analyzing the wealth of raw information generated in the markets. Each stock is given a score, a simple single-digit score showing how the stock measures up against a composite of 8 factors known to predict future gains. A ‘Perfect 10’ from the Smart Score indicates a stock that is worth a closer look.
When these ‘Perfect 10′ Smart Score stocks align with Goldman Sachs’ Top Picks, it creates a compelling signal that the average investor can’t afford to overlook.
With that in mind, let’s take a look at a few of those tickers – ones that have earned a spot on Goldman Sachs’ Top Picks list and nailed a ‘Perfect 10’ on the Smart Score.
Philip Morris International (PM)
We’ll start with a classic ‘sin stock,’ the tobacco company Philip Morris International. Philip Morris has long been a leader in its industry, and has a headline asset – the full rights to produce and market the Marlboro brand, one of the world’s largest cigarette brands, in the international markets. The company also owns the Next, Chesterfield, L&M, and the eponymous Philip Morris brands. PM is positioned in more than 175 markets around the world, and boasts of holding first- or second-place market shares in most of them.
The tobacco industry was valued at over $867 billion last year, and despite social pressures against it, it is expected to expand to $1.05 trillion by the end of this decade – so Philip Morris’s market-leading positions are no small potatoes. The company is working…
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