Graham's defensive investor screen

Benjamin Graham set out his rules for the "defensive investor" in The Intelligent Investor: someone who wants a sound portfolio without the work of deep analysis. He asked for companies of adequate size, in strong financial condition, with a long record of dividends and of growing earnings, bought at a moderate multiple of earnings and of book value.

stockrow applies those rules to today's figures. A company must be worth more than $2 billion, have current assets at least twice its current liabilities and less debt than equity, have paid a dividend for ten years without cutting it, have grown earnings per share by more than 3% a year over ten years, and trade below 15 times trailing earnings and 1.5 times book value. Graham asked for twenty years of dividends and compared the price with average earnings over three years; this screen uses the ten-year record and trailing earnings, so it is a close approximation rather than his exact test.