Every Thursday we bring you one of our best U.S. stock picks. You get our specific recommendation on the stocks we profile, with a full explanation of how we arrived at our opinion. You will read about stocks making moves you should know about, most often from coverage in our newsletter on U.S. investing, Wall Street Stock Forecaster.
DUN & BRADSTREET CORP. (New York symbol DNB; www.dnb.com) began operating in 1841 and is now the world’s largest provider of credit reports on individual companies. Its database contains information on 240 million businesses in over 200 countries. Companies use these reports to make lending and purchasing decisions and to cut their credit losses.
Credit reports supply 63% of Dun & Bradstreet’s revenue. The remaining 37% comes from other information products, such as software that helps businesses manage websites and customer data.
In 2014, revenue rose 1.7%, to $1.68 billion from $1.65 billion in 2013. All regions saw gains: North America (74% of revenue), up 1.2%; Europe (15%), up 4.1%; and Asia (11%), up 1.9%.
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Stocks to buy: Dun & Bradstreet pays $125 million for firm that collects corporate officers’ data
The company spent $80 million on new growth initiatives, including cloud-based delivery systems. It’s also adding new information to its databases, including through acquisitions. For example, it recently paid $125 million for NetProspex, a firm that collects corporate officers’ contact information, including email addresses, phone numbers and titles.
These costs cut Dun & Bradstreet’s 2014 earnings by 8.5%, to $274.9 million from $300.5 million in 2013. Per-share earnings declined 1.8%, to $7.46 from $7.60, on fewer shares outstanding.
Dun & Bradstreet can easily afford to keep investing in new products. Its long-term debt of $1.35 billion is a manageable 28% of its market cap. It also holds cash of $319.4 million, or $8.80 a share.
The company should earn $7.72 a share in 2015, and the stock trades at a moderate 17.5 times that estimate. It also raised its dividend by 5.1%. The new annual rate of $1.85 a share yields 1.4%.
Dun & Bradstreet is a buy recommendation of our advisory on U.S. investing, Wall Street Stock Forecaster.
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Every Thursday we bring you one of our best U.S. stock picks. You get our specific recommendation on the stocks we profile, with a full explanation of how we arrived at our opinion. You will read about stocks making moves you should know about, most often from coverage in our newsletter on U.S. investing, Wall Street Stock Forecaster. 
