At the present time interest rates are very very very low, however some of the best companies to invest in have little debt and solid balance sheets to grow through all cycles of the economy. In a chart by Emily Halverson-Duncan of Morningstar Research, she looked through the company’s data base at 2,092 stocks and came up with the top 15.

debt to equity ratio less than or equal to 1.1

debt to total assets ratio in the lower 2/3 of its peers, this chart is 0.4 or lower

cash flow to debt in the top 2/3 of its peers in this chart it is 0.27 or higher

market capitalization in the top 2/3 of its peers, it this chart it is 1.3 billion or higher

trailing ROE in the top 1/3 of peer, the value is 16.9% or higher

5 year beat of less than 1.3

The companies which are in the list are:

Company Mkt Cap Debt/ Debt/ CF/ Trailing 5 Yr Div Recent

($ bil) Equity T Assets Debt ROE% Beta Yld Price

NetEase.com 46.032 0.0 0.0 0.0 23.3 0.7 1.9 359.77

Take-Two Interact 14.728 0.1 0.0 6.1 24.2 0.5 0.0 129.85

Logitech Internat 8.597 0.0 0.0 18.2 29.4 1.0 1.4 51.39

CommVault Systems 2.094 0.0 0.0 10.4 20.1 0.8 0.0 44.95

Veeva Systems 28.708 0.0 0.0 9.6 22.3 0.9 0.0 192.34

National Beverage 2.423 0.1 0.1 4.1 32.9 1.1 0.0 51.98

WD-40 Co 2.393 0.5 0.2 1.0 36.5 -0.1 1.5 175.11

Intuit Inc 73.030 0.2 0.1 3.5 50.8 1.0 0.8 280.36

Biogen 51.244 0.4 0.2 1.3 48.4 0.5 0.0 314.02

Cadence Design 23.021 0.2 0.1 2.2 36.9 1.1 0.0 82.46

the other companies on the list are:

Accenture, Paychex, VMware Inc, Lululemon Athetica and Copart

Linking to dividend paying stocks. the world is awash in inexpensive debt but some companies do not need the debt financing, they generate enough cash flow not to have debt. Notice some of the companies are in the software business but they are not household names. This is why these lists help you decide what is important in your investing decisions.

There are more questions than answers, till the next time – to raising questions.