6 Smart Stock Ideas For A Barbell Strategy

Steven Cress, VP of Quantitative Strategy, dives into a powerful "Barbell Strategy" designed to navigate the high volatility of 2026. This data-driven approach balances high-growth AI "dip" opportunities with high-yield dividend stocks to protect your downside.Explore Alpha Picks Today!Join Pro Quant Portfolio Now!Sign Up For Premium Today!This video's transcript was generated by a third party. It is not curated or reviewed and is provided for convenience and information purposes only. The accuracy and completeness of the transcript are not guaranteed.Daniel Snyder: Hello, everyone. I'm Daniel Snyder from Seeking Alpha. Thank you so much for tuning in to this video here today. We are diving into conversation with the one, the only, you may know him as Steven Cress, the VP of Quantitative Strategy here at Seeking Alpha. We're going to dive into six stocks that he's put together for a barbell strategy in this market right now. The volatility seems like the markets can't really budge this year. We've got so much to talk about. And before we dive in with him, let's go ahead and get a quick legal disclaimer out of the way.We are not advising you personally concerning the nature, potential, value, or suitability of any particular security. You alone are solely responsible for determining whether any investment, security, strategy, or any product or service is appropriate or suitable for you based on your investment objectives and personal and financial situation.This presentation is for information purposes only. Content is presented as of the date published or indicated and may be superseded by future events. It represents my opinions and Steven Cress' opinions, which may not reflect the views of Seeking Alpha as a whole.Past performance is no guarantee of future results, and Seeking Alpha is not a licensed securities dealer, broker, US investment adviser, or investment bank.And with that out of the way, Steven Cress, how are you doing this week?Steven Cress: Daniel, thank you for the warm introduction. I'm doing really well. Actually, really pumped that we're doing this presentation on our barbell strategy right now. I feel like this is déjà vu, going back to last year around this time, and we went with that barbell strategy, and the markets got pretty ugly. And I can't tell you how many notes of thanks I received going with this approach, and we're going to dive into what the barbell strategy approach is.For those of you who are new to Seeking Alpha, just a little bit of my background. I've been in the investment world for over 30 years. Most of my career was spent at Morgan Stanley where I ran a prop trading desk in quantitative strategies, but I also founded a hedge fund in quantitative strategies and a fintech company in quantitative strategies that Seeking Alpha bought. And that's what has me here today on this really fun journey.So, a little bit about the barbell approach. So, the barbell approach, it's something that I think I have custom tailored for the client base, our subscriber base at Seeking Alpha for volatile periods or for what I anticipate will be a volatile period. And, certainly, the markets have demonstrated it's one step forward, one step backwards, indicating there's a lot of uncertainty. There's definitely been a rotation into the safe haven sectors as we'll demonstrate later in this presentation. So, the barbell approach is basically identifying some dividend stocks that can pay us during the volatility, but simultaneously also identifying stocks with great fundamentals that have taken a bit of a hit. And, really, what we find in markets like this is sentiment and fear drive the market down, drive the uncertainty.A lot of companies still have really solid fundamentals, and we want to take advantage of that market weakness. So, we combine both approaches together to develop that barbell strategy, where on one hand we have the risk oriented stocks that are in dip mode, and then the other stocks that pay a nice dividend yield and help protect us on that downside. So, that's a little bit about the barbell strategy, and it has worked well for us in the past.So, I just want to give you a little bit of a market overview now as we just seem to be all over the place year-to-date. We're heading into March, so the markets are pretty flat. The market rally that we had last year seems to continue to cool with the rotation out of tech and into value, especially small and mid-cap value, but we're also seeing that rotation to safe haven sectors such as consumer staples, utilities, and anything that could be from cash and certainly gold and silver have done very well this year.The mega cap growth stocks have come under pressure. So, the Magnificent 7 that did so well in 2024, 2025, and partially in 2026 have really started to come off. And in fact, the Mag 7 stocks year-to-date are down about 7% versus the S&P 500, which is up 1.6%. And over the last couple of years, the Mag 7 stocks have crushed the S&P 500. And, again, we're seeing also investors rotate into energy, which did not really perform well over the last two years. Year-to-date, energy is doing well. Materials, as I said, gold and silver are doing well. Utilities and consumer staples year-to-date, the technology sector is actually down about 2.5%. So, not down quite as much as the Mag 7, which shows you a lot of technology stocks are actually outperforming the Mag 7 despite the whole sector being down about 2.5%.Meanwhile, the energy sector has risen 23% year-to-date. That is a huge rally. Lot of that has to do in the frigid weather we're having in the Northwest, the central part of the country, and certainly in the Northeast, freezing temperatures and lots of snow, where I am right outside of New York City. So, that has certainly helped. And geopolitical events as well continue to be volatile, which helps to support the materials stocks.So, going on to our next slide. Actually, if you look on the right hand side, I don't want to ignore that. You could actually see the performance for 2026 of the Mag 7 stocks. With Microsoft, which has just traditionally been a real stalwart, is down 17% year-to-date. Amazon down almost 14%. Apple down almost 6%. And NVIDIA, who just came out with great earnings, is actually down 2%. So, none of the Mag 7 doing well this year.DS: Steve, real quick. I do want to mention that chart that you just showed. I want to make sure everybody highlights. We pulled this from YCharts back on February 13. And as of today, February 26, these numbers have, of course, changed a little bit. Like, I was just looking, Amazon has pulled up a little bit, but you're still seeing that overall weakness within that IT sector and the Mag 7, like you were talking about.SC: Daniel, I appreciate you picking up on that because some of the charts are as of yesterday and you're right, some of the charts are from February 13. Sorry for that not being updated.DS: Although Microsoft is still down 17% as of today.SC: So, two weeks hasn't made a difference for Microsoft.DS: Exactly.SC: So, something else that really is hanging over the market, and a lot of investors haven't really thought about it, but some are, the midterm elections that are coming up. And midterms historically always present a problem for the markets. It's not just with the current administration or the Republican led senate and house. Traditionally, midterms, as you could see from this chart, which goes all the way back to 1950, you could see, pre-midterm, where you see a lot of the red. The markets have really pulled back during a lot of those periods. And then post the election, the markets have done very well. So, we're in that phase now where we're pre-midterm election, and there's a lot of uncertainty. And really markets hate uncertainty, and they tend to come down when we have uncertain periods.Markets tend to do better even if there's, like, fully bad news is baked in. It's baked into the market so the investors know what to do. When uncertainty clears up, the markets typically rise because investors feel more comfortable, but it's that uncertainty, the unknown that leads to all this red that we see going back to 1950. So, historically, midterms have displayed poor performance on the market. And as I mentioned, momentum really tends to pick up afterwards.And certainly this time around, in addition to the midterms, we still continue to have global tensions. The tariff threats have seemed to ignite again, and there's a lot of uncertainty with what has been issued from the Supreme Court and then the administration counteracting that. So, just lots of uncertainty there. And we saw a little bit of a pullback in gold and silver, but because of the uncertainty, we have seen those markets and commodities rally right back.And the markets also have – as I have said, is broadening out. The market and the broader market have been a benefactor of interest rates coming down towards the end of 2025, and that really benefits small and mid-cap companies, particularly value mid cap and small cap stocks. And the reason is, when interest rates are lower, their debt levels are not as high, so they get to earn more money. So, even with the uncertainty facing the market, the fact that rates have come down, it should start panning out for those companies this year and later this year. So, that's why we're seeing some of the Magnificent 7 pull back, and many of the value small cap and mid cap companies actually starting to benefit.So, now we also have AI, and that's really – that tends to either be a huge driver of the market to a point where people feel like it's bubble status, or right now, it's like an albatross hanging around the neck of the market with many investors thinking that valuations are way, way too expensive. So, despite recent rotations, we do continue to see AI adoption growing at an – just at unprecedented and incredible level. I've highlighted before that ChatGPT has over 1 billion monthly active users, and that's just up from 200 million only two years ago. So, it's incredible that you can go from 200 million users to 1 billion in a two-year period. And if you look, the right hand side, we have a great chart that shows the artificial intelligence market, and it's almost like a hockey stick the way it's going up.You could see at the current levels, 2025, it was at $390 billion, 2026 at $539 billion. And then by 2033, it's really not that far out. It's estimated that it will be a $3.4 trillion marketplace. And Daniel and I were actually just talking about this prior to the webinar today, how individuals are using AI, how corporations are using AI. It's just spreading all over the place. There's almost no one that I know, whether they're individual or they work within a corporate entity, that is not using AI. So, the demand continues to be tremendous. And with AI, there's a tremendous demand for data centers and energy as well. So, it has a direct and indirect impact on many, many different sectors.So, that brings us to why are we talking about this barbell approach and incorporating it into Quant? Well, Quant is a very useful methodology for investing. It tends to eliminate a lot of white noise and emotion. So, I've been using Quant for quite a long time, and we have a really good track record. So, I want to tell you a little bit about what Quant is?Quantitative investing uses data, math, and algorithms to identify investment opportunities. So, that might sound very advanced, but, honestly, that's the way many analysts approach investing. We're looking for companies from a Quant perspective the same way an analyst would look at a company. I was an analyst for many years. And the way an analyst from Goldman Sachs or Morgan Stanley or Merrill Lynch looks at other companies, they look at the fundamentals, so they look for core investment characteristics.We utilize characteristics that are – we tend to look for companies that are actually collectively strong on a number of characteristics, such as value, growth, profitability, momentum, and EPS revisions. And analysts that assess companies use many of these metrics as well. The difference is with Quant, though, we basically take large pools of data for all companies, and we have powerful computer processing that lets us assess thousands and thousands of stocks literally in the same day. And as an individual, you are only capable of analyzing just a few stocks a day. And, really, when you have a universe of stocks that you cover, you tend to focus maybe on a sector or industry, and one analyst is only capable really of writing on 15 or maybe 20 companies in terms of the coverage they have.From a Quant perspective, we have close to 5,000 stocks, and we assess those companies every single day. Our database is refreshed every day. So, on a daily basis, we're going through every company's balance sheet, cash flow statement, income statement, and hundreds of metrics. And what we do is, we compare those data points for a company to all the other companies in the sector, and that's how we separate the weak from the strong. And we can come up with a directional recommendation that would be a Strong Buy, Buy, or a Sell.Now, with our particular strategy, I use something called the GARP, which is Growth At a Reasonable Price. And those would be the investment characteristics that I mentioned, which would be profitability, value, growth, momentum, and analyst positive EPS revisions. So, we're looking to identify the companies on those metrics. So, I refer to that as a GARP approach. Not all Quant models are the same. Some will just focus on value. Some will focus on momentum. Some will focus on growth. We tend to like the diversity of having a number of different factors, as well as the diversity of different market caps. We look at micro-cap, small cap, mid cap, large cap, and mega cap as well in addition to international stocks and U.S. stocks. So, it's really taking that powerful computer processing, the conventional analysis that's used by analysts, and combining it together that gives us a very powerful tool.And we have a good track record. This is the last five years. What we're looking at is all our Strong Buys rebalanced every single day. So, this is not an ETF or an investment product that we manage. This is simply displayed just to show how our Strong Buys perform on a daily basis and rebalancing it daily.So, if a stock falls off of a Strong Buy, it would not be counted. If it's a Strong Buy, the performance is counted. And we measure that against Wall Street Analysts Strong Buys and the S&P 500. And you could see over the last five years that our Strong Buys were up a 173% versus Wall Street analysts, I hate to say, are only up 5.89%. So, over the last five years, we have not seen really good performance out of Wall Street analysts Strong Buys, and the S&P 500 up close to 60% during that period. So, the Quant system handedly beating both Wall Street analysts and the S&P 500 over the last five years.So, how do we pick the stocks? I just want to make sure I didn't miss a slide here. I did miss a slide. Okay. Thought I missed a slide. I wanted to show you the shorter-term performance, as well. What you're looking at, virtually the same slide, but instead of being five years, it's year-to-date. And you could see the Quant Strong Buys year-to-date are up 9.3%. Wall Street analysts actually having a better year than most. They're up 5% year-to-date, and the S&P 500 on an equal weighted basis is up 6.27%. Down at the bottom here, we showed the S&P that you typically look at on a market cap weighted basis is up only 1.6%. So, Quant Strong Buy is having a very good year.Now, there are products that we do manage, and we'll talk about that later in the presentation, but I just want to demonstrate for the purposes of performance and how well the Quant system works. We have one product called Alpha Picks. Since inception, which is from July 1, 2022 that's up 301% versus the S&P market cap weighted up 82%. And we have a new product that we started back in June of last year called the PRO Quant Portfolio, which is up 40% versus the S&P 500 on an equal weighted basis up 15%. We separate sometimes equal weighted basis from market cap weighted because some of our products are equal weighted, so we try to keep it apples-to-apples. But the point here being with two different products that we manage and all our Strong Buys, you could see that the Quant system works very well.So, today, we're going to focus on some great AI stocks, and we're also going to focus on some great stocks that provide a nice dividend yield. So, that's part of our barbell approach. So, how did I pick the Top AI stocks? What we did is, I selected basically four of the largest AI ETFs out of the marketplace, basically uploaded all the stocks that are in those ETFs into our Quant system, and then we ran our Quant model. And that helped us to determine what we perceived as a Strong Buy from just the AI stocks, and we were also did see what stocks were Sells in our system as well. So, we were able to really dissect all four ETFs and using the Quant metrics that we feel are important to use that directional recommendation and find those Strong Buys.The Seeking Alpha Quant system, as I mentioned, whether you're looking at AI stocks or auto stocks or energy stocks, it's always going to decipher the strong companies from the weak companies. So, that's how we picked some of these AI stocks, and here's the list right here. You could see there's LITE, which is a Strong Buy, which is Lumentum. We have Micron, which is a Strong Buy, and we have TTM, which is a Strong Buy as well. I'm going to go into depth a little bit in those, but just the top line numbers that I want you to see. You could see the year-over-year revenue growth for LITE is almost 49%.

For Micron Technology, it's 45%, and for TTM, it's almost 19%. The forward growth in almost all these cases are stronger than the year-over-year growth, which is great. You could see with LITE, it's 50% for Forward Growth rate for revenues. For MU, it's 57%. And for TTM, it's, 17.8%. Just a little lower than its year-over-year number. The EBITDA numbers for the Forward growth rate are incredibly strong for all three companies with, LITE, coming in at a 127%, Micron at 99%, and TTM at 25%. So, these are the three AI stocks…DS: Real quick. I just want to clarify for everybody. It's TTMI. TTMI is a different ticker.SC: Yeah. And you're going to see the name of the company coming up shortly. So…DS: Is it TTM Technologies? Oh, I just saw that. That's on me.SC: Okay. So, we'll pop to that one so you could see it's TTM Technologies.DS: You're right.SC: So…no worries. No worries. So, our first pick, Lumentum Holdings, LITE, has a market cap of $49 billion and it is a Quant Strong Buy. It's in the IT sector, obviously. It ranks 3 out of 535 companies within this sector. So, as I mentioned, the Quant system, it ranks all the companies, and this is amongst the top. And within its industry, which is Communications Equipment, it ranks 1 out of 38. It has a tremendous one-year return. It's up almost a 1000%, but I don't want that to distract anybody. The return over a 52-week period or over a six-month period should have no bearing. What you want to focus on is the company's valuation and growth at this point in time versus the sector.So, if you look to the far right, you'd see for the factor grades, and the factor grades are all sector relative. So, it lets you know, it basically provides you with an instant characterization of how that company stands on value, growth, or profitability versus the sector. So, you could see the valuation is a D+. So, it's a bit expensive versus the sector, but six months ago, it was a C. So, there's not really a tremendous difference between a C and a D+. So, the fact that the stock is up about a 1000%, the valuation is almost the same now than it was six months ago, and the growth remains an A+.So, the growth is very, very strong for this company versus the IT sector. Its profitability is in line, but the momentum of its stock beats the sector. And analyst revisions, you could see are very positive, more so than even three months ago. Analysts have been taking their estimates up for the company. It's one of the highest – it is the highest grade you can get as an A+, and three months ago, it was a B. So that grade level actually making a big jump from three months ago. So that means the analysts are more positive in the company now than they were three months ago.This company has a tremendous long-term EPS growth rate. The three-to-five year CAGR is 100% for growth versus the sector at just 16%. Its operating cash flow growth is 245% versus the sector at just 15%, and the PEG is at 0.91, putting it at a 30% discount to the sector. So, even though the overall valuation at D+ is fairly expensive, the PEG ratio, which is a ratio I love because it combines P/E and growth together, it puts it at a sizable discount to the sector.Our number two stock, Micron Technology, a tremendous market cap at $470 billion. Again, another Quant Strong Buy. This ranks number 2 in the IT sector. And within semiconductors, it actually ranks 1 out of 70 semiconductor companies. The one-year return on this stock is 359%. And as I said, the fact that it's made that move should not be important. What's important is where its fundamental stand versus the sector or its historical average. And you could see the valuation at C+. It has dropped about a grade from where it was six months ago.So, it's a little bit more expensive, but it is still A+, which means it just about has the strongest growth that you will find in the IT sector. So, well worth that valuation. This company also incredibly profitable. Momentum versus the sector has been tremendous, and analysts continue to love it. And I'm actually going to take us to the platform so we could take a closer look at Micron Technology.So, you could see the stock is a little bit weak down about 3% today, and really this is what we're discussing, is the uncertainty in the environment. You have companies that could have very strong fundamentals. They will most likely come off in this type of environment, so you want to take advantage of these dips. So, this is not a huge dip from its high, but it's still a bit of a dip and a chance to buy it a little bit lower. When we're looking at valuation, I'm going to click on this.DS: Just to mention as well, we're filming this right after NVIDIA just reported earnings, which took a hit as well. So, all the semiconductor stocks have taken their hits today.SC: Yeah. And what's crazy is they beat both top line and bottom line, and the stock is still taking a hit. So, it just shows you how much sentiment can drive investors and market prices. So, despite the company beating expectations, sentiment right now is fairly negative, and investors are uncertain. So, they're selling into the news. So, from a valuation perspective, what I love about this is, you could see on the Forward P/E is an A-, which is excellent. The PEG is an A- as well. So, the valuation, even on the conventional metrics on a Forward basis, it looks great. On a trailing basis, it looks expensive. Hence, the overall C grade, but I would really focus on the Forward P/E here and the PEG ratio. It's just really an outstanding valuation framework on those metrics.If we click on profitability, it's an A+, and you could see the EBIT margin, and the EBITDA margin, A+ grades. And we tend to be really transparent. So, even those grades give you an instant characterization of where that metric is versus the sector, we show the absolute data as well. So, on the EBIT margin, you could see it's 32.55%, and the sector's at 6.71%. Hence, it's at a 385% premium to the sector, thus the A+ grade.So, very transparent. And in case over here, if we're looking at leverage free cash flow, you could see it's a D+. It's only 1.05% versus the sector at 11%. So, it's at a negative 90% difference to the sector, hence the D+ grade. That's why it's lower. However, most of the profitability metrics are very, very strong. Return on equity at 22%. And another one that's very, very impressive that we see is cash per share at $8.64 and cash from operations at a whopping $22 billion for Micron.In terms of analyst revisions, we could see here that in the last 90 days, 31 analysts have taken their earnings estimates up and 0 have taken it down. So, this is showing us that analyst continue to like the company more and more. They continue to believe that the company will be making more money. And as you could see, from the historical reporting periods that we just came in, the company reporting a beat of $0.82, and has just been repeatedly beating quarter-in and quarter-out on both a top and bottom line basis. So, the fact that the stock is down on this beat today shows you that the fundamentals for the company are there, but sentiment's driving down. Great to take advantage of that.Going to go back to our slideshow? And the number three stock with a disputed title, the name of the company, TTM Technologies, ticker symbol TTMI. All those T's could be a mouthful, Daniel, so it can confuse the best of us.DS: I just wanted to make sure we got the ticker correct for everybody that's reading the transcript.SC: Yeah. And I'm probably speaking pretty fast as well, so I apologize for that. So TTM Technology, ticker symbol TTMI, market cap $11 billion, a Quant Strong Buy, obviously, in the IT sector ranking 5 out of 535 stocks. This company within the industry is actually electronic manufacturing services ranking 1 out of 18. One year return up almost 350%. This company offers a one stop design and manufacturing solution for aerospace and defense, AI infrastructure, auto, and medical industries. So, they do really tend to focus on aerospace and defense, which is also a great sector to be in.So, the fact that they're supplying that within the AI world makes it even more powerful recommendation. They are a leading global manufacturer of advanced technology circuit boards, radio frequency, and specialized mission components.The ROE growth rate. not the ROE, but the ROE growth rate for the company year-over-year is up a 191%. So, the ROE level itself is just growing tremendously. You could see actually for the sector, it's a negative level, the growth rate for return on equity. And, again on a PEG basis, it is at 0.3x. This is at a 68% discount to the sector. So, even though we see that valuation grade at a D+, and it is a lot more expensive now than it was six months ago, on a PEG basis where you combine those two metrics, it's very attractive. But more importantly, if we look at the growth, the growth grade for the company is at A now versus six months ago was a C. So that is a huge, huge jump up on growth. So, I will take that with a D+ valuation and an A for growth. I'll take that any day. And you could see the profitability is in-line with the sector, but the momentum and analyst revisions is very, very strong.And we're going to give you a bonus stock. Okay? I want to highlight AppLovin Corporation, ticker symbol APP. This is actually a Quant Buy, but this company has some fantastic numbers. It is not quite as attractive in terms of maybe some of the fundamentals that were once present, but the growth for this company is tremendous. So, I really want to highlight it. And the stock has really been a laggard. And one of the reasons why it's been a laggard is, it's a high beta AI stock. And at one point, the stock was just – it was up about a 1000%.So, the one year return has not been quite as good as it was going back over the previous year, but the long-term growth rate for the company is 35% versus the sector at 16%. And I actually want to take us back to the platform so you could actually visually see this. So, we're here on the stock page, and you could see Wall Street analysts have a Buy on it. Seeking Alpha contributors have a Buy, and the Quant System has a Buy. The valuation, if you look at the stock, it has come off tremendously. So, year-to-date, the stock is actually down 33%.DS: Massive pullback. Wow.SC: Massive, massive pullback. So, this is the temp – I look at it today. Actually, the stock is up 5.53%. So, people are starting to realize, okay. So, this has just pulled back way too much. You could see the valuation is more attractive now than it was six months ago, moderately. It's moved to C- versus D. So, the valuation was really extended on it. The growth is still incredibly strong. It has an A for growth. It has an A+ for profitability, and analysts are still very positive.So, I do want to highlight the earnings here. So, we're taking a look at the company. Look at all the quarters that recently over the – since 2023, okay, every single quarter, since the second quarter of 2023, they have beat bottom line. And almost every quarter except one, they beat on a top line basis as well.DS: Barely missed. $2.7 million for a company like this is a nothing.SC: Nothing. Yeah. You're looking at revenues of $1 billion. That's not even really a miss. But look at the way the revenue numbers are going up, from like, if you go back to the beginning of 2023, it was at $715 million. Fast forward to 2024, it's $1 billion, and now it's resting at $1.66 billion. So, company is seeing a massive jump in revenue, as well as earnings going, literally from negative $0.01 to $0.22 to $1.25 to the current $3.24.So, I think this company is well worth highlighting as the bonus stock, and my anticipation is, and you could actually see here there's a level of support down at around $366. So, I really think that's the bottom for the stock. And the company continues…DS: I can’t believe my ears, Steve. You're bringing a little bit of technical analysis through the Quant system.SC: Right? But I think it does show good support there. People know that it's just, when it gets to that level, it's just oversold, so they start buying. And a couple more quarters like we saw today, and the stock is going to be right up there moving significantly as well. Back to our presentation.DS: Nice bonus stock.SC: Okay. Now, we're going to get into our dividend stocks. So, again, we're in a period of uncertainty. The market's only up about 1% heading into March. Problems with geopolitical tensions, problems with tariffs, problems with sticky inflation, a lot of unknowns with labor. In the second half of last year, labor numbers were weak. Now, they're looking a little bit better. So, the anticipation is that the Fed will not be as aggressive taking rates down, and they may not take rates down at all.So, creating a lot of uncertainty is a really good period to have a balance in your portfolio of stocks that have a dividend and stocks that have strong fundamentals on the dip. Dividend and dip, that's the way to go in a market that's uncertain. The stocks that we're recommending today all have dividend yields over 4%. And I think, actually, when you average it out, it's close to about 5.3% in terms of the dividend yield.So, we're going to get into the stocks here. You could see we have Getty, which is a REIT. We have Bristol-Myers, which is a pharmaceutical company, and we have PINE, which is a REIT too. So, you could see the forward dividend yields on these, 5.95% for Getty, 4% for Bristol-Myers Squibb, and PINE coming in at 6%. And then if we take the trailing dividend and we average it out, it gets to the level of - the forward yield. So, if we take the forward yield, it is 5.35%, all three combined. That is significantly more than the market, and it's significantly more than even the Vanguard High Dividend Yield Index ETF as well.So, let's get into Getty a little bit. It's got a market cap of $1.95 billion. In the real estate sector, it ranks 8 out of 170. But within its segment of Retail REITs, it ranks 1 out of 24. If you look to the far right at the Factor Grades, the valuation is attractive at a B. Growth is a B+. Profitability is an A-. Momentum B+, so it's doing much better than many other REITs. And analyst revisions, this is really important. Analysts are much more positive on this company now with a revision grade being an A+ versus six months ago, it was a D. So, analysts significantly more positive on the stock.As I mentioned, that's a REIT that is focused within the retail sector. They're focused on single tenant properties with the convenience of automotive retailers as well. Their asset mix includes over 1,174 properties in 44 states. Again, focused around gas stations, auto centers, and diversified express car washes. So, a lot of diversification within states and the number of properties that they have as well. They also have a portfolio of customers that include 7-Eleven, Jiffy Lube, British Petroleum, and Tidal Wave Auto Spa.Stock number six, Bristol-Myers Squibb in the healthcare segment. This is a Quant Strong Buy. Within the healthcare sector, ranks 11 out of 964 stocks. And within pharmaceuticals, it ranks 6 out of a 178. Really nice dividend yield on it of 4% right now and a payout ratio of just 40.49%, so pretty low. I'm sure many of you are familiar. This is a global biopharma company focused on high impact therapies, including oncology, immunology, cardiovascular, and neuroscience.Their blockbuster drugs are Eliquis and Opdivo, which continue to drive revenue and earnings. Year-to-date, the stock is up 13.64%, handedly beating the S&P, and the healthcare sector as well, which is only up about 1.96%. So, it's beating the sector. It's beating the overall market and has a sweet yield at 4%.And Alpine Income Property Trust, ticker symbol PINE, that has a lower market cap at $325 million, so not nearly as big as some of the other stocks. But within the real estate sector, ranks 2 out of 170. And within diversified REITs, it actually ranks 1 out of 12. This has a really nice forward dividend yield at 6%. This is an owner and acquirer of high quality net lease commercial properties. Alpine's business focuses on generating low risk cash flow through long-term leases where the tenant is responsible for most of the expenses. Tenants include Walmart, Lowe's, Home Depot, and more like those. So, those are great tenants to have. Again, the yield, 6% on Alpine Income Property Trust.And I believe let's see, did we get all that? We got Getty, we got Bristol-Myers, and we got Alpine. So, we got all three. And this is what it looks like overall with these stocks combined together. It will give you a picture of the Factor Grades from valuation, growth and profitability, momentum, and EPS revisions, as well as the performance over the last 52-weeks. And on the far right side, you could actually see what the Forward EPS growth rates are and the Forward revenue growth rates and for the stocks that have yields.So, again, the AI picks was, I think, really noticeable about that when we're looking at the revenue growth. The Forward revenue growth rate for all four AI stocks is 35% versus the S&P Forward revenue growth rate at only 6%. So, the growth rate for these stocks is significantly higher than the S&P 500. And, of course, these stocks are within the technology sector, and, specifically, they all have an AI focus to it, and that is helping to sustain the company's growth.The dividend stocks, the average TTM yield is 5.18%. The Forward dividend yield, as I mentioned before, is 5.35%, and that's versus the Vanguard High Yield Index, which only has a yield of 2.26%. So, again, the Vanguard High Yield Index, one of the more popular Dividend yield ETFs, comes in with a yield of 2.26%, and these three recommendations have an average yield on a trailing basis of 5.18%.So, Daniel, I think the timing is really good in terms of presenting these stocks right now with a barbell approach. A lot of people like our webinars, and I write articles, which are very popular too. When you see one of those articles, please just follow me, and you'll continue to get other articles. What I will say, though, is, there's a lot more outside of these webinars and articles. So, we do provide, two products, which I mentioned earlier in the presentation, the performance, which is, beating the S&P 500.So, the two products that I have are the PRO Quant Portfolio and Alpha Picks. And the PRO Quant Portfolio, which we just came out with last June, is designed for investors that like a high frequency of ideas. Alpha Picks was designed for investors that just like a steady low flow of ideas. So, Alpha Picks, we generate two ideas a month on the trading date closest to the 1st, and the 15th of the month, and we tend to focus with Alpha Picks, stocks that are predominantly in the United States, have market caps over $500 million. We don't invest in companies that are below $10 a share. And on average, we'll see two to three trades occur per month with Alpha Picks.You could see the return for Alpha Picks since inception is pretty significant. It's up 300% versus the S&P up 82% for the same period. The PRO Quant Portfolio was designed for investors who want more than two ideas a month, and the PRO Quant Portfolio actually rebalances on a weekly basis. On average, we have two to three new ideas per week.Interesting enough, the PRO Quant Portfolio was a derivative of Alpha Picks because many of our Alpha Picks customers wanted a higher frequency of ideas. So, we developed the PRO Quant Portfolio, and this is a fixed portfolio of 30 ideas where with Alpha Picks, we continually focus on new names, and it's not a fixed portfolio level. Also, the parameters and criteria for PQP are less stringent than Alpha Picks. So, we invest in U.S. stocks. We invest in ADRs. There is no market cap restrictions, so we have everything from micro stocks to mega cap stocks in it all over the world. And, again, for investors who are a little bit more aggressive in terms of wanting a higher flow of ideas. You can see the PRO Quant Portfolio since June is up 40% versus the S&P on a equal weighted basis, up 15% for the same period.And I believe that's it. Daniel, thank you very much for arranging us today. I'll go back to this list here.DS: Absolutely. Yeah. I wanted to dive in to – first off, thank you for the time. Thank you for this information, putting the stock picks together. I know we all greatly appreciate it. And everyone, as you mentioned, if you haven't explored Alpha Picks or PRO Quant Portfolio, you can find the links for that beneath this video. Highly encourage you to check it out. I mean, you get dedicated webinars. You get a full analysis write-up of every stock pick. It happens every week or month depending on which service you're in. But for the stocks today, Steve, I have two questions I'd like to squeeze in here, if you don't mind.SC: Sure.DS: Specifically looking at these picks. One year price performance on these AI stocks, which I love to mention as well while we've been doing this webinar, Block just had a headline come across saying with their earnings that they're reducing their workforce by 40%, thanks to AI productivity gains. So, it'll be interesting to see how this affects the market. The stock's up 20% on the news. How it's going to affect the overall market going forward?I mean, AI is the play. So, I love how you have a balanced approach here focusing on AI on that one side, but all of these stocks have a crazy one-year price performance increase. And I know for most humans, like us that are not Quants, that are not the Black Box that are trading, we look at these numbers and we go, you're buying at the high. Why would I buy at the high? I can't touch this. What would you share with those people about why these valuation metrics and momentum and profitability and everything still makes sense that it may not be too late at this moment?SC: Yeah. So, I think, Micron is a great example. The stock is up 333%, and the valuation is almost the same as it was six months ago, yeah, with a C grade being a B+, and the growth is just as strong as it was six months ago. So, let's click on valuation. We'll look at some of these underlying metrics.So, I think what's really interesting is, despite the incredible growth that we've seen in the stock that huge, huge run up, and we look at the P/E, the Forward P/E, it's only 12.65x. That is dirt cheap for the IT sector. Okay? If you take a look at Micron and that P/E now, okay, versus the five-year average, the five-year average for that multiple was 74x. So, the current P/E is at an 83% discount to its five-year historical average. So, it's not only at a 43% discount to the sector, it's at an 83% discount to its five-year average. The growth is tremendous for this company. Okay?If we look at the forward revenue growth, it's 57% versus the sector at 10%. So, who cares if the stock could be up a 1000%? Its growth rate is stronger than its historical average. Its growth rate is stronger than the sector, and its valuation framework is far better than the sector at its average. So, the fact that it's moved up 10%, 500%, or a 1000%, it doesn't matter. You have to look at a stock, compared to its sector and many times, compared to its historical average. But, really, the most important is to measure it against the sector to determine the valuation framework and the growth framework. That's what's important.DS: Alright. One more question for you real quick right here. If you wouldn't mind going over to LITE, that we covered as preferred stock here today for AI side of the barbell. The big question that I've heard from people when we give webinars before about stocks is, they look at the short interest metric, which on this stock I noticed was 14.85% - is covered short. What would you say to that? I mean, is that when we have discussions, we think about short squeeze potential, or is this actually maybe…?SC: I would definitely not want to be short the stock. I will tell you that. Let's look at the earnings. Okay? So, looking at the earnings, the previous quarter, they came in at $0.07, with their beat. And this quarter, they came in with a beat of $0.26. Earnings has jumped from literally if we went to the second quarter of 2024, they reported $0.42 in the second quarter of 2025. I'm sorry. To the current quarter, $1.67. Okay? That is a huge jump up. And look at the increases that we're seeing in revenue. For the same period, revenue went from $400 million to $665 million. Would you want to be short of stock that's doing that well? I certainly would not.So, I could definitely foresee, probably many hedge funds over the last year have suffered extreme pain by being short this stock. And, the fact that it's still at a short interest level of 14.85% just says that some people are glutton for punishment.DS: Alright. Yeah. I wanted to squeeze that one in there. Everyone, we hope you got some great value out of this video here today. If you haven't already, go follow Steven Cress here on Seeking Alpha. That is free. Just sign up and get all of his analysis that his team is putting out. And as well, again, go check out Alpha Picks. Go check out PRO Quant Portfolio. Both of those are incredible products built on the backbone of the Quant System and his team that is currently always updating, always in there, telling people when to sell their picks, when to buy the next pick on the 1st or the 15th trading day if it's Alpha Picks or weekly if it's PRO Quant Portfolio. Highly encourage you to check those out. But, everyone, thank you so much for taking the time to tune in today and watch this video. Steve, as I mentioned earlier, the titan of the Quant system here at Seeking Alpha, thank you so much for your time today.SC: Thank you very much, Daniel.DS: Alright, everyone. Have a great rest of the week, and we'll see you here in the next video. Take care.Explore Alpha Picks Today!Join Pro Quant Portfolio Now!Sign Up For Premium Today!