The price is up 12.2% since I bought these shares of Berkeley Preferred (WRB-A) and, because of that, the yield is down from 8.85% on February 11. But at 7.6% this is still a great way to make some money if, as I expect, the market goes sideways this summer. Of course, none of that would matter if the company wasn’t doing a good job at navigating the financial crisis. The $108 million write-down that WR Berkley took in the fourth quarter, for example, was on invested assets of $12.5 billion. In April the company told Wall Street that it expects a turn for the better in the pricing of its insurance lines by the end of 2009. As of June 30, I’m raising my target price to $24 a share by March 2009. (Full disclosure: I own shares of W.R. Berkley Preferred A in my personal portfolio.)
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Two different classes of stock. The common pays roughly 1%. The preferred pays around 7-8%.
It’s probably that I don’t understand, but one lookup gives the dividend and yield on this stock as 7.5%, as you mention in your update, and another
(online.barrons.com/public/quotes/main.html?symbol=wrba) says the latest dividend is 10/01/2009, in the amount of 6 cents, for a yield of 0.95%. Have they cut the dividend that much, or is there something I don’t understand?
Thanks
Jack