Dover's Core Doing Okay And New Management Brings New Options

I’ve never hid the fact that Dover (DOV) is not among my favorite companies, and over a longer-term holding period, you’d still have done better with names like 3M (MMM), Illinois Tool Works (ITW), Fortive (FTV), Danaher (DHR), and Ingersoll-Rand (IR). That said, Dover shares have been performing meaningfully better on a relative basis over the past couple of years, first with the recovery in the energy sector, then the spin-off of Apergy (APY), and what I believe is building optimism about what a change at the top (a new CEO) could mean in terms of self-improvement.

My complaints about Dover have largely centered around low margins/elevated expenses, weak returns on capital, and a collection of businesses with iffy long-term strategic value. New CEO Richard Tobin seems eager to start work on the expense side of the equation, and I wouldn’t rule out the possibility of management shuffling the deck a little further down the road (selling some businesses and perhaps buying some new ones). While I’m warming up to Dover from a strategic perspective, the valuation still isn’t all that enticing to me, though a longer run of this industrial up-cycle could certainly generate some upside to my expectations.

Follow this link to the full article:
Dover's Core Doing Okay And New Management Brings New Options