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Yahoo
8 minutes ago
- Yahoo
How The J. M. Smucker Company (SJM) Fits into the Food Dividend Stock Portfolio
The J. M. Smucker Company (NYSE:SJM) is included among the 10 Best Food Stocks with Dividends. A wholesaler distributing peanut butter, fruit spreads and specialty spreads to a retailer. The J. M. Smucker Company (NYSE:SJM) is recognized as a strong value in the food sector, with several successful brands under its belt. Notable performers include pet food lines like Meow Mix and Milk-Bone, as well as the well-liked Uncrustables sandwich products. The company paid a premium when it acquired Hostess Brands in November 2023. To refocus its efforts, the company recently sold off some brands from its Sweet Baked Snack segment, including Voortman, to concentrate more on the Hostess portfolio. Although the transition has been challenging, The J. M. Smucker Company (NYSE:SJM) appears to be moving in the right direction. It anticipates full-year fiscal 2026 sales to grow by 2% to 4%, despite the effects of divesting certain Sweet Baked Snack value brands. The company is also expected to deliver strong earnings and free cash flow. In fiscal Q4 2025, The J. M. Smucker Company (NYSE:SJM) reported operating cash flow of $393.9 million, and its free cash flow was $298.9 million. During the quarter, the company returned $114.5 million to shareholders through dividends, reinforcing its commitment to investor return. This cash position enables the company to consistently raise its dividends. The J. M. Smucker Company (NYSE:SJM) declared a 1.9% hike in its quarterly dividend on July 16. This marked the company's 24th consecutive year of dividend growth, which makes it one of the best food stocks with dividends. The company now offers a quarterly dividend of $1.10 per share and has a dividend yield of 4.04%, as of July 27. While we acknowledge the potential of SJM as an investment, we believe certain AI stocks offer greater upside potential and carry less downside risk. If you're looking for an extremely undervalued AI stock that also stands to benefit significantly from Trump-era tariffs and the onshoring trend, see our free report on the best short-term AI stock. READ NEXT: READ NEXT: and Disclosure: None.
Yahoo
8 minutes ago
- Yahoo
US-China talks to restart as hopes grow for trade war truce extension
The US and China are due to start a fresh round of talks on Monday as expectations grow that the world's two biggest economies could agree a 90-day extension to their trade war truce. The meetings in Sweden - led on Washington's side by Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and for Beijing by Vice Premier He Lifeng - come hours after US President Donald Trump announced a framework tariffs deal with the European Union. The current 90-day truce between the US and China - which saw the two countries temporarily lowering tariffs on each other - is set to end on 12 August. Since Trump returned to the White House in January, the US and China had raised import levies on each other to more than 100%. The current 90-day tariffs pause came after top officials from the US and China met in Geneva and London earlier this year. Last week, Bessent said talks with China were in "a very good place" and suggested the new round of talks could result in a second truce. On Monday, citing sources on both sides, the Hong Kong-based South China Morning Post reported that the US and China are expected to extend the truce by another three months. The BBC has contacted the Chinese embassy in the US and the US Treasury Department for comment. The latest US-China talks come after Washington struck deals with both the EU and Japan in the last week. On Sunday, Trump and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen announced a trade agreement framework. It ended a months-long standoff between two of the world's biggest economic partners. Last week, Trump said Washington had agreed a "massive" trade deal with Tokyo. Under the agreement, Japan would invest $550bn (£407bn) in the US while its goods sold to America would be taxed at 15% when they reach the country - below the 25% tariff Trump had threatened. The US has also struck tariffs deals with the UK, Indonesia and Vietnam. At 10%, Britain has negotiated the lowest US tariff rate so far. No similar breakthrough is expected from the US-China talks this week but, with expectations of an extension to their truce, there are hopes that global trade will not be hit by fresh tariffs disruption. Asia is reeling from Trump's tariff salvo – is anyone winning? What the US-Japan deal means for Asia and the world Sign in to access your portfolio
CNN
11 minutes ago
- CNN
Analysis: Trump lands another big win with EU trade deal, but he can't dodge the Epstein saga
Donald Trump European Union Tariffs FacebookTweetLink President Donald Trump claimed another win for his campaign to transform the global economy and American life, but he still can't escape intensifying questions over his handling of the Jeffrey Epstein controversy. The United States clinched a framework deal with the European Union on Sunday that averted a damaging trade war. Trump believes such moves will revive US manufacturing. But the resulting 15% tariff on EU goods entering the US likely means American consumers will face higher prices in the long term. This is a significant step. So Trump's insistence that it was not simply a bid to distract from the Epstein saga is reasonable. 'Oh, you have got to be kidding with that,' the angry president told a reporter. But his irritation underscored his failure to shrug off weeks of revelations about the case and his own past friendship with the accused sex trafficker, who died in prison in 2019 while awaiting trial. Mystery surrounds the administration's motives after Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche, Trump's former personal lawyer, met last week with Epstein's imprisoned accomplice, Ghislaine Maxwell. Her lawyer implied that Maxwell was open to a presidential pardon. Trump's record of using such power for political purposes has critics warning he may be seeking a deal that would politicize justice. The storm back home isn't abating. Two lawmakers, one Democrat and the other Republican, vowed Sunday to force a vote on the House floor on the release of Epstein case files. Such a vote could embarrass the administration and create a major political showdown. This came on a typically frenetic weekend that Trump spent in Scotland and that served as a metaphor for his turbulent influence on America and the globe. He juggled the highest-level diplomacy — talks with the EU's top official, Ursula von der Leyen — with a trip promoting his business empire, in this case his portfolio of exclusive Scottish golf clubs. His visit was greeted with street protests by caustic Scots and featured outbursts of extreme rhetoric — including his social media call for the prosecution of former Vice President Kamala Harris. Trump will come face-to-face Monday with pressure to force Israel to do more to mitigate a growing famine in Gaza. He'll see British Prime Minister Keir Starmer at his Turnberry resort in southwest Scotland before traveling with Starmer to Aberdeenshire, where Trump will inaugurate a new course at another club. Starmer last week said of the crisis in Gaza that 'we are witnessing a humanitarian catastrophe.' Much is unknown about the scope of the trade deal with the EU, which will see a 15% tariff imposed on most of the bloc's exports and billions of dollars in purchases of US energy. But it extends a winning streak and a record of implementing campaign promises for a president who is imposing personal power and often idiosyncratic beliefs — for instance in the effectiveness of trade tariffs — on the US and the world. 'This was the big one. This is the biggest of them all,' Trump said Sunday after meeting von der Leyen, the president of the European Commission. Von der Leyen followed the accepted wisdom that praising Trump personally can provide political payoffs. 'He is a tough negotiator, but he is also a dealmaker,' she said. Trump has recently announced framework deals on trade with Japan and the Philippines — which both include higher tariffs that represent a fracturing of the 21st-century global free-trade arrangements. Trump believes that this system, which helped make the US a dominant global power, is nevertheless unfair on American workers and industries. And he rejects economists' arguments that raising tariffs increases prices for already-stretched US consumers. Trump is flexing power everywhere. He is gutting the federal government, dominating Congress, and exerting unprecedented pressure on law firms and universities to impose his right-wing ideology, all while seeking to intimidate media outlets. These are wins for his populist 'Make America Great Again' movement and its program to buckle what supporters see as liberal power. But as with Trump's outlier belief in tariffs, the long-term impacts that his actions could have on American society, the economy and democracy are alarming critics. Trump has politicized the legal system; his government funding cuts have hampered vital scientific research on critical subjects such as cancer; and his expanding of presidential power often tests the Constitution. Still, markets may welcome the EU trade deal framework, assuming it is fully implemented — hardly a given considering Trump's volatile history of threats and reversals. An EU-US trade war would have been a far worse outcome. But the agreement confirms suspicions that Trump's goal is not fairer trade but higher tariffs. Although existing tariffs have so far not harmed the economy as much as some experts feared, Americans will pay more for cars, food, luxuries and consumer goods. The inflationary impact on the economy, and Trump's likely appointment next year of a new Federal Reserve chair who will lower interest rates, could mean greater economic threats to come. There's also an important geopolitical aspect to the EU trade deal. The Europeans committed to buying $880 billion of energy from the US. This could make America's NATO allies less vulnerable to pressure from Russia at a time when the Western alliance is opposing Moscow's invasion of Ukraine. 'We still have too much Russian LNG (liquid natural gas) that is coming through the back door again to our European Union, and some Russian gas and oil still in the European Union, which we do not want anymore,' von der Leyen said. Trump's frustration that a key political achievement has been overshadowed by the Epstein saga is unlikely to dissipate in the coming days. The controversy started because of conspiracy theories among Trump's base that claimed the disgraced financier did not take his own life in prison but was murdered, and that he left behind a client list of rich and powerful Americans who'd taken advantage of his alleged sex trafficking. These claims were promoted by Trump and allies including Pam Bondi and Kash Patel. When all three assumed positions of great power (Bondi is attorney general, and Patel is FBI director), their failure to release the files as promised caused a rupture in Trump's MAGA base, which the administration has failed thus far to repair. The political uproar explains why Blanche's meeting with Maxwell last week caused such consternation. Maxwell's lawyer told reporters after her second day of meetings with Blanche in Tallahassee, Florida, that she had answered every question truthfully and honestly. He also noted that the president has the power to pardon those convicted of crimes. 'We hope he exercises that power in a right and just way,' the attorney, David Oscar Markus, said Friday. Blanche has so far not offered a detailed public account of the meetings. There is no evidence of wrongdoing by Trump in his relationship with Epstein, and the president appears to have severed the friendship long before the accused sex trafficker was charged with federal crimes. But the Justice Department's unorthodox approach is raising concerns that it goes beyond a public relations effort to convince MAGA voters the administration is doing something. Maxwell, who is serving a 20-year prison term, has an incentive for providing information that could ease her situation — and Trump has the power to do so. Questions over the president's motives became even more important when CNN and other outlets reported last week that Trump's name was mentioned in the Epstein files, along with those of some other prominent Americans. This does not mean that he or anyone else is guilty of wrongdoing. In fact, Bondi might have made the correct decision legally in refusing to release information that could harm the reputation of people not accused of crimes. But beyond a joint Justice Department and FBI statement on the rationale for not releasing the files, the administration has rarely attempted to justify a policy that has put it at odds with its own supporters in the MAGA movement. 'I'm concerned that the deputy attorney general, Todd Blanche, is meeting with (Maxwell) supposedly one-on-one,' Democratic Rep. Ro Khanna of California said on NBC's 'Meet the Press' on Sunday. 'Look, I agree … that she should testify. But she's been indicted twice on perjury. This is why we need the files.' Republican leaders hoped the case might simply disappear over the summer recess. But Kentucky GOP Rep. Thomas Massie, a co-sponsor with Khanna of a House bill demanding the release of the files, isn't giving up. 'This is going to hurt Republicans in the midterms. The voters will be apathetic if we don't hold the rich and powerful accountable,' Massie said on NBC. 'I think when we get back, we can get the signatures required to force this to the floor.' The Trump administration has asked the courts to release grand jury testimony pertinent to the Epstein case. But one federal judge refused last week, in a ruling that may have given the DOJ political cover. 'We want them to release the files. However, we can't make them release it because of separation of power,' Oklahoma GOP Sen. Markwayne Mullin told Jake Tapper on CNN's 'State of the Union.' That may be the case. But grand jury testimony is believed to be only a fraction of the evidence against Epstein that the government holds — and hasn't made public. And the entire controversy has been worsened by the administration's clumsy approach and unwillingness to confront the anger of the MAGA base. 'I think that part of this problem is that there were some false expectations that are created, and that's a political mistake,' Missouri Republican Rep. Eric Burlison told CNN's Manu Raju.
