Tobacco stocks remain favorites of investors looking for a combination of defensive positioning and stout dividends.
Some of the largest tobacco stocks, such as Altria Group Inc. and Phillip Morris International have hefty market values, and are important parts of some well-known consumer staples exchange traded funds (ETFs).
At press time, Wall Street was expecting Altria’s earnings per share (EPS) of US $0.67 on sales of US$4.8 billion; Phillip Morris’ estimated EPS was US $1.12 on sales of US $6.67 billion; and Reynolds American had analysts expecting its EPS of US $0.60 on revenue of US $3.16 billion.