A Goldman Sachs-Harvard MBA’s Formula For Investing In Volatile Times

3/11/2014

My former boss, a former Goldman Sachs Fund Manager and Harvard MBA who managed money for some of the biggest pension funds and endowments in the country, had a special formula for investing in stocks during volatile times.

The formula had the following criteria:

1) A Market Cap greater then $10 Billion
2) Five Year Projected Annualized Earnings Growth greater than 5%
3) A dividend yield greater than the 10 year treasury bond.

The reasoning behind the screen is simple, you want a stock whose earnings are growing because it offers protection against inflation, secondly large brand name companies are less volatile and more recession proof than smaller unknown companies and buying stocks with dividend yields higher than the 10 year treasury bond allows you to get stock like returns with bond like risk.

Will Meade
President of The Billionaires Portfolio