Best Dividend Companies To Invest In 2014

In the following video, Fool contributor Maxxwell Chatsko tells investors about pipeline developments from��Merck (NYSE: MRK  ) . The Food and Drug Administration will review Biologics License Applications, or BLAs, for two investigational allergy tablets in the first half of 2014. Investors awaiting the next big pipeline hit to help replace falling revenue from patent expirations throughout the portfolio should have their ears perked up on the news.��

How do these tablets work in the body? What is their revenue potential? Maxxwell explains just what it means for Merck and investors and answers one important question.

Can these products help Merck beat the patent cliff?
This titan of the pharmaceutical industry stumbled into 2013 and continues to battle patent expirations and pipeline problems. Is Merck still a solid dividend play, or should investors be looking elsewhere? In a new premium research report on Merck, The Fool tackles all of the company's moving parts, its major market opportunities, and reasons to both buy and sell. To find out more click here to claim your copy today.

Best Dividend Companies To Invest In 2014: Intel Corporation(INTC)

Intel Corporation engages in the design, manufacture, and sale of integrated circuits for computing and communications industries worldwide. It offers microprocessor products used in notebooks, netbooks, desktops, servers, workstations, storage products, embedded applications, communications products, consumer electronics devices, and handhelds. The company also provides system on chip products that integrate its core processing functionalities with other system components, such as graphics, audio, and video, onto a single chip. In addition, it offers chipset products that send data between the microprocessor and input, display, and storage devices, including keyboard, mouse, monitor, hard drive, and CD, DVD, or Blu-ray drives; motherboards designed for desktop, server, and workstation platforms, and that has connectors for attaching devices to the bus; and wired and wireless connectivity products consisting of network adapters and embedded wireless cards used to translate and transmit data across networks. Further, the company provides NAND flash memory products primarily used in portable memory storage devices, digital camera memory cards, and solid-state drives; software products comprising operating systems, middleware, and tools used to develop, run, and manage various enterprise, consumer, embedded, and handheld devices; and software development tools that enable the creation of applications. Additionally, it develops computing platforms, which are integrated hardware and software computing technologies designed to offer an optimized solution. The company sells its products principally to original equipment manufacturers, original design manufacturers, PC components and other products users, and other manufacturers of industrial and communications equipment. It has a strategic alliance with Scientific Conservation Inc. Intel Corporation was founded in 1968 and is based in Santa Clara, California.

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By Paul Ausick]

  Within the first hour of trading on Monday morning, shares of Facebook Inc. (NASDAQ: FB) have risen more than 3% and the company�� market cap has risen to about $102 billion. Intel Corp. (NASDAQ: INTC) has slipped a little and the chipmaker�� market cap now stands at about $111.5 billion. Can it be that social media will soon be more valuable than the world�� largest maker of semiconductors?

• [By Benjamin Pimentel]

  Shares of Intel Corp. (INTC) , Nvidia Corp. (NVDA) �and SanDisk Corp. (SNDK) �also posted gains.

• [By Andrew Tonner]

  After sinking to some truly bottom-of-the-barrel prices, shares of chip giant Intel (NASDAQ: INTC  ) have recovered nicely so far in 2013 on the strength of the company's ongoing turnaround plan. The company has embraced the mobile future and is closer than ever to gaining a presence in the increasingly mobile future. But despite this positivity, the company does remain depressingly dependent on the PC market. So between the two, what's an investor to make of the situation? In this video, Fool tech and telecom analyst Andrew Tonner breaks down both the positive and negative arguments for Intel today.

• [By Mark Hibben]

  The AMD processor in the PS4 will feature an 8 core "Jaguar" CPU and what is billed as a "next-generation Radeon" graphics processor integrated onto a single chip. Just as so many Intel (INTC) processors have become systems on chip (SOCs) integrating CPU cores with a graphics processor, AMD has been integrating Radeon graphics processors into their own line of Intel compatible devices. According to a recent AnandTech review of AMD's current top-of-the-line desktop APU, the A10-5800K, the graphics performance of the APU is quite a bit higher than the built in graphics of Intel's Ivy Bridge Core i7 3770K, although only equivalent to a mid-grade discrete graphics processor unit (GPU).

Best Dividend Companies To Invest In 2014: Kimberly-Clark Corporation(KMB)

Kimberly-Clark Corporation, together with its subsidiaries, engages in the manufacture and marketing of various health care products worldwide. The company operates in four segments: Personal Care, Consumer Tissue, K-C Professional & Other, and Health Care. The Personal Care segment provides disposable diapers, training and youth pants, and swimpants; baby wipes; and feminine and incontinence care products, and related products. It offers its products primarily for household use under various brand names, including Huggies, Pull-Ups, Little Swimmers, GoodNites, Kotex, Lightdays, Depend, and Poise. The Consumer Tissue segment offers facial and bathroom tissue, paper towels, napkins, and related products for household use under the Kleenex, Scott, Cottonelle, Viva, Andrex, Scottex, Hakle, and Page brands. The K-C Professional & Other segment offers facial and bathroom tissue, paper towels, napkins, wipers, and a range of safety products for the away-from-home marketplace und er Kimberly-Clark, Kleenex, Scott, WypAll, Kimtech, KleenGuard, Kimcare, and Jackson brand names. The Health Care segment offers disposable health care products, such as surgical drapes and gowns, infection control products, face masks, exam gloves, respiratory products, pain management products, and other disposable medical products under the Kimberly-Clark, Ballard, and ON-Q brand names. The company sells its products to supermarkets; mass merchandisers; drugstores; warehouse clubs; variety and department stores; retail outlets; manufacturing, lodging, office building, food service, and health care establishments; and high volume public facilities. It markets its products through wholesalers, distributors, and direct sales. The company was founded in 1872 and is based in Dallas, Texas.

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By Dividends4Life]

  Kimberly Clark Corp. (KMB) is a global consumer products company's producing tissue, personal care and health care products. Its brands include Huggies, Pull-Ups, Kotex, Depend, Kleenex and Scott. The company has paid a cash dividend to shareholders every year since 1935 and has increased its dividend payments for 41 consecutive years. Yield: 3.3%

• [By Dividends4Life]

  Linked here is a detailed quantitative analysis of Kimberly-Clark Co. (KMB). Below are some highlights from the above linked analysis:

  Company Description: Kimberly Clark Corp. is a global consumer products company's producing tissue, personal care and health care products. Its brands include Huggies, Pull-Ups, Kotex, Depend, Kleenex and Scott tissue.

Top 5 Stocks To Invest In Right Now: (TELNY)

Telenor ASA operates as a telecommunication company worldwide. It provides mobile communication, fixed line communication, and television (TV)-based services. The company?s mobile communication services include voice, data, Internet, content, and electronic commerce services, as well as customer equipment, such as telephone sets, mobile phones, smart phones, computers, and PABX?s. Its fixed line services comprise analogue PSTN, digital ISDN, broadband telephony, xDSL, Internet, and leased lines, as well as communication solutions. The company?s TV-based services consist of pay-TV services via satellite dish, cable TV-networks, satellite master antenna TV-networks systems, broadband access services to cable TV-subscribers, and broadcasting rights, as well as security solutions to pay-TV operators. It also provides consulting and information technology services; maritime and aircraft telecommunications services; Internet protocol services; and mobile marketing agency service s, as well as manages two funds. The company has approximately 120 million mobile subscriptions. Telenor ASA was founded in 1885 and is headquartered in Fornebu, Norway.

Best Dividend Companies To Invest In 2014: Dreyfus Strategic Municipals Inc. (LEO)

Dreyfus Strategic Municipals, Inc. operates as a diversified, closed-end management investment company. The fund invests primarily in municipal obligations of various states of the United States. The Dreyfus Corporation serves as the investment adviser of the fund. Dreyfus Strategic Municipals was founded in 1987 and is based in New York City.

Best Dividend Companies To Invest In 2014: Amphenol Corporation(APH)

Amphenol Corporation engages in the design, manufacture, and marketing of electrical, electronic, and fiber optic connectors; interconnect systems; and coaxial and specialty cables worldwide. Its Interconnect Products and Assemblies segment produces connectors and connector assemblies primarily for the communications, aerospace, industrial, and automotive markets. This segment provides connector and cable assembly products used in communication applications; smart card acceptor and other interconnect devices used in mobile telephones; set top boxes to facilitate reading data from smart cards; fiber optic connectors used in fiber optic signal transmission; backplane and input/output connectors and assemblies used for servers and data storage devices and linking personal computers and peripheral equipment; sculptured flexible circuits used for integrating printed circuit boards; and hinge products used in mobile phone and other mobile communication devices. It also designs a nd produces radio frequency connector products and antennas used in telecommunications, computer and office equipment, instrumentation equipment, local area networks, and automotive electronics. The company?s Cable Products segment produces coaxial cable and connector products used in cable television systems, including full service cable television/telecommunication systems; radio frequency and fiber optic interconnect components for full service cable television/ telecommunication networks; and data cables and specialty cables used to connect internal components in systems with space and component configuration limitations. Amphenol Corporation markets its products directly, as well as through manufacturers? representatives and distributors to original equipment manufacturers, contract manufacturers, cable system operators, and telecommunication companies. The company was founded in 1932 and is headquartered in Wallingford, Connecticut.

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By Sally Jones] % over 12 months, Amphenol Corporation has a market cap of $12.88 billion and is traded at a P/E of 21.70. The dividend yield is 0.60%.

  The current share price is around $80.94.

  Incorporated in 1987, Amphenol Corporation designs, manufactures and markets electrical, electronic and fiber optic connectors, interconnect systems and coaxial and specialty cable. The markets for the global company's products are communication systems for the converging technologies of voice, video and data communications and a wide range of industrial applications including factory automation and motion control systems, medical and industrial instrumentation, and commercial aerospace and military applications, and many more.

  Guru Action: As of June 30, 2013, Columbia Wanger reduced its position by 0.69%, selling 29,000 shares at an average price of $76.60, gaining 7.5%.

  Columbia Wanger is the top guru stakeholder with 4,184,650 shares or 2.63% of shares outstanding.

  Over a phenomenal five-year trading history, the firm averaged a gain of 215% on 828,250 shares bought at an average price of $25.71 per share. Columbia Wanger also gained 56% selling 1,608,300 shares at an average price of $51.91 per share.

  Check out the very active insider selling and seven gurus holding APH.

  Track share pricing, revenue and net income:

  [ Enlarge Image ]

• [By Ben Levisohn]

  Competitor AVX Corp. (AVX) has gained 1.1% to $12.96, while Molex (MOLX) has dropped 0.2% to $29.28 and Amphenol (APH) has ticked up 0.3% to $76.32.

Best Dividend Companies To Invest In 2014: Avon Products Inc. (AVP)

Avon Products Inc. manufactures and markets beauty and related products worldwide. Its product categories include color cosmetics, fragrances, skin care, and personal care; fashion jewelry, watches, apparel, footwear, and accessories; and gift and decorative products, housewares, entertainment and leisure, and children?s and nutritional products. Avon Products Inc. markets its products through direct selling and independent representatives, as well as through distributorships. The company was founded in 1886 and is based in New York, New York.

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By Holly LaFon]

  In the fourth quarter, Yacktman�� biggest additions to his holdings were Research In Motion (RIMM) and Avon Products (AVP). He also surprised followers by venturing into financials, with new positions in Goldman Sachs (GS), Bank of America (BAC), State Street Corp. (STT) and Northern Trust Corp. (NTRS).

• [By Rich Duprey]

  Health and beauty products provider Avon Products� (NYSE: AVP  ) �will pay a regular quarterly dividend of $0.06 on�June 3 �to shareholders of record at the close of business on May 14. That's the same amount it declared in February and November.
  

• [By Justin Loiseau]

  Avon Products (NYSE: AVP  ) plans to lay off more than 400 full-time employees and exit Ireland�as part of its $400 million cost-cutting initiative, the company announced today.

Best Dividend Companies To Invest In 2014: Xcel Energy Inc.(XEL)

Xcel Energy Inc., through its subsidiaries, engages in the generation, purchase, transmission, distribution, and sale of electricity to residential, commercial, and industrial customers, as well as to public authorities in the United States. The company generates electricity using coal, nuclear, natural gas, hydro, wood, diesel, and wind energy. It also engages in the purchase, transportation, distribution, and sale of natural gas to residential, commercial, and industrial customers. The company serves customers in portions of Colorado, Michigan, Minnesota, New Mexico, North Dakota, South Dakota, Texas, and Wisconsin. As of December 31, 2010, it provided electricity services to 3,391,611 customers; and natural gas services to 1,893,250 customers. Xcel Energy, through its joint venture interests in WYCO Development LLC, develops and leases natural gas pipeline, storage, and compression facilities. The company was founded in 1909 and is based in Minneapolis, Minnesota.

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By Justin Loiseau]

  Xcel excels at cutting carbon
  Xcel Energy (NYSE: XEL  ) announced today that it expects to surpass its goal of a 20% CO2 reduction by 2020 by up to 7%. Xcel has favored wind as its main method for getting rid of greenhouse gases. The utility currently owns 4,900 MW of wind capacity, approximately 12% of its total generation portfolio.

• [By Shauna O'Brien]

  Jefferies announced on Wednesday that it has raised its rating on Xcel Energy Inc (XEL).

  The firm has upgraded XEL from “Hold” to “Buy,” and has raised the company’s price target from $31 to $32.50. This new price target suggests a 15% upside from the stock’s current price of $27.72.

  Analyst Paul B. Fremont commented: “The stock is currently trading at an 8% P/E discount to our 2015E group average multiple.”

  “Despite a difficult political environment in Minnesota the company was able to achieve a reasonable outcome in its NSP-Minnesota rate case,” the analyst added.

  Looking forward, the firm has increased its FY2014 outlook from $1.95 to $2.00 per share.

  Xcel Energy shares were mostly flat during pre-market trading Wednesday. The stock has been mostly flat YTD.

Best Dividend Companies To Invest In 2014: NYSE Euronext Inc.(NYX)

NYSE Euronext, through its subsidiaries, operates securities exchanges. It operates various stock exchanges, including the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE), NYSE Arca, Inc., and NYSE Amex LLC in the United States; and five European-based exchanges that comprise Euronext N.V. ? the Paris, Amsterdam, Brussels, and Lisbon stock exchanges, as well as the NYSE Liffe derivatives markets in London, Paris, Amsterdam, Brussels, and Lisbon. The company?s Derivatives segment provides access to trade execution in derivatives products, options, and futures; offers clearing services for derivative products; and sells and distributes market data and related information. NYSE Euronext?s Cash Trading and Listings segment engages in offering access to trade execution in cash trading and settlement of transactions in European markets; obtaining new listings and servicing existing listings; selling and distributing market data and related information; and providing regulatory services. Its Info rmation Services and Technology Solutions segment operates sell side and buy side connectivity networks for its markets and for other market centers, and market participants in the United States, Europe, and Asia; provides trading and information technology software and solutions; sells and distributes market data and related information to data subscribers for proprietary data products; and offers asset management services, and consultancy services to exchanges and liquidity centers. The company is headquartered in New York, New York.

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By Alex Planes]

  The New York Stock Exchange -- the larger part of NYSE Euronext (NYSE: NYX  ) -- moved into its present home on 18 Broad Street (on the corner of Broad and Wall Street) on April 22, 1903. It was an architectural marvel for its time, with a massive open trading floor without any supporting columns, huge windows, six miles of pneumatic tubes for routing orders, and one of the world's first air-conditioning systems. Even if you've never visited this iconic location, you're probably well-acquainted. It is one of the most famous buildings in the world:

• [By WWW.DAILYFINANCE.COM]

  Richard Drew/AP WASHINGTON -- Regulators have approved the proposed $8 billion sale of the venerable New York Stock Exchange to a much younger futures exchange. The deal is a symbol of how financial markets are being increasingly reshaped by high technology. The Securities and Exchange Commission disclosed Friday that it's authorized the takeover of the two-centuries-old NYSE's parent by Atlanta-based IntercontinentalExchange, or ICE. The rival acquiring company, founded in 2000, has expanded rapidly through acquisitions during the past decade. The SEC said in a filing that it's determined that the merger of the exchanges would comply with securities laws and regulations. The merger also must be approved by regulators in Europe. The NYSE's parent is NYSE Euronext, which includes stock exchanges in Europe. The European Commission, the executive body of the 28-nation European Union, gave its approval in June. The deal is expected to close in the fall. For each share of NYSE Euronext stock they own, shareholders would be able to choose either $33.12 in cash, about a quarter-share of ICE, or a combination of $11.27 in cash and around one-sixth of a share of ICE. ICE's offer was valued at $8 billion when it was announced in December. Based on ICE's current share price, the deal would be worth about $10 billion. ICE (ICE) shares were up $1.12 at $181.47 in trading Friday. NYSE Euronext (NYX) shares rose 22 cents to $42.07. "We welcome the [SEC] decision," NYSE Euronext spokesman Rich Adamonis said. ICE representatives didn't immediately return a call seeking comment. ICE has said that little would change for the NYSE trading floor -- known as the Big Board -- at the corner of Wall and Broad streets in Manhattan's financial district. But the NYSE'S clout has been eroded by the rapid advance of technological and regulatory changes. Its importance today is mostly symbolic. While brokerage fees for stock trading have declined, futures exchanges like ICE ha

• [By Maureen Farrell]

  Now, their major rivals -- the New York Stock Exchange (NYX) and Goldman Sachs (GS, Fortune 500) -- are expected to be the big winners in the next hot IPO: Twitter.

• [By Hibah Yousuf]

  In a report outlining the growing operational risks at trading exchanges, S&P said the noticeable increase in technical snafus could trigger ratings downgrades for major operators like NYSE Euronext (NYX), Nasdaq OMX (NDAQ) and BATS Global Markets over the next few years.