Email this article Format for printing

Hidden Treasures in the Foolish Four

We discuss the answers to yesterday's scavenger hunt questions and learn more about some of the hidden treasures in the Foolish Four area.

By Ann Coleman (TMF AnnC)
July 6, 2000

I hope you enjoyed yesterday's pop quiz. Today we'll go over the correct responses to the first half of the quiz, and hopefully we'll all learn more about finding answers to almost any Foolish Four question in the process.

In the answers below, the URLs will take you straight to the page that has the answer. The clickstream will give you the series of links you need to click to find the answer. All clickstreams start in the right nav. (Lost already? The right nav is short for "right navigation column." It's all that stuff listed on the right side of this page starting with the Top Dow Stocks list. Ummm, maybe I'd also better mention that a "clickstream" is the series of hyperlinks that you click on to go from one page to another, and the URL is the Internet address, that thing that starts out http://.)

If you've found another path to the right answer, go right ahead and give yourself credit. I trust you.

1. What is the dividend yield for Merck (NYSE: MRK)?

   Hint: Yield is one of the things we need to determine which stocks are chosen for the Foolish Four list.

   Clickstream: Today's Stock Lists / Select: I want to beat the... "Dow" Using the... "List All Stocks" / Go

   URL: http://quote.fool.com/livecalc/LiveCalc.asp (You will have to use the pulldown windows to select Dow and List All Stocks, then hit Go to see the answer.)

   Merck was #17 on the list of Dow stocks with a dividend yield of 1.52% when I wrote this. It may have changed a bit by the time you check, but that's the beauty of LiveCalc. It gives you up-to-date prices, dividends, yields, and RP numbers for the 30 Dow stocks and the 30 Beating the S&P stocks.

2. Which Dow stock has the highest RP Ratio?

   Hint: RP ratio is what determines today's stock lists.

   Same clickstream and URL as #1.

   If you found #1, the hint tells you that you can just go back to LiveCalc via the Today's Stock Lists link where you will see that Philip Morris (NYSE: MO) is solidly in first place, as it has been for quite some time now, with an RP of 1.354401, more than twice as high as Caterpillar (NYSE: CAT), the next highest stock on the list.

3. Where would you find a Foolish Four article titled "Information Ghoulore"? (And who came up with that horrible headline?)

   Hint: The hint is in the pun.

   Clickstream: F4 Archives / 1999, scroll down to 10/29/99

   URL: http://www.fool.com/ddow/1999/ddow991029.htm

   "Information Ghoulore" was Barbara Bayer's Halloween column for last year. (We don't always write our own headlines, but that one was pure Barb.) The archives list every Foolish Four column to appear on our website. They are a great resource, but they can be a bit much to look through if you don't have a hint about the date something ran.

   To use the archives more efficiently, try using the Find on This Page feature of your browser (Control F or see the Edit Menu). You can enter a key word and see if any of our titles match.

   An alternative way to find this article would be to simply enter "Information Ghoulore" into the Search box at the top of the page. Our search feature will comb through our entire site for matches, and if you don't like what it finds, you can click on Advanced Search (on the Search Results page) and refine your search.

4. Which stocks were in the original "Real Money" Foolish Four portfolio?

   Hint: See the note way down at the bottom of this page.

   Clickstream: F4 Archives / 1998 / 12/23/98 or click on any 1999 portfolio report prior to December 24 and check the bottom of the page.

   URL: http://www.fool.com/ddow/1998/ddow981223.htm

   The inaugural stocks were Caterpillar, J.P. Morgan (NYSE: JPM), International Paper (NYSE: IP), 3M (NYSE: MMM).

   The note at the bottom of the page tells us that the real-money portfolio started on December 23, 1998. Three clicks takes us right to that article, but there's a faster way. You can get there with one click if you already have a page from our archives in a browser window. For example, with Barb's Halloween column, the URL in your browser address line will read:

   URL: http://www.fool.com/ddow/1999/ddow991029.htm

   Note the date embedded in the URL -- 991029 (yymmdd)

   You can easily change the date to 981223, and the altered URL will take you straight to the December 23, 1998, article. Cool, eh?

5. Which stocks are in the current Foolish Four Portfolio?

   Hint: It's not the four with asterisks on the Top Dow Stocks lists.

   Clickstream: Today's Numbers

   URL: http://www.fool.com/DDow/DDow.htm#NUMBERS

   Our current stocks are Caterpillar, J.P. Morgan, Kodak (NYSE: EK), and General Motors (NYSE: GM).

   The right nav link "Today's Numbers" will take you quickly to the bottom of this page, where the current portfolio returns are located. (The link above it, Current Report, will bring you to the most recently published Foolish Four article from anywhere in the area. FYI: Wherever you are on any archived portfolio report page, Today's Numbers will always take you to the bottom of the archived report, which is another way to find the original Foolish Four stocks.)

My editors get rather alarmed when a portfolio report starts to drag on the floor, so in the interest of keeping this report under three feet long, the rest of the answers will run tomorrow.

You didn't buy that entirely, did you? OK, yes, your suspicions are correct. I'm taking the day off tomorrow. (But I would still have to break it up.)

Fool on and prosper!

 See Also