Stocks With Terrible Ticker Symbols: BYD, Nintendo and 8 Others

Some sterling international stocks are hiding behind terrible ticker symbols, which makes it a great idea to examine them closely. Consider the German luxury car maker Mercedes-Benz Group (ticker: MBGYY ), which is trading at just 6.3 times its projected earnings for the year 2023. Or when it comes to the gaming company Nintendo NTDOY +1.00% ( NYDOY ), which is currently trading at a price of 14.3 times earnings.

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It is difficult to remember stocks with long symbols and it is easy to overlook stocks with long symbols. The only thing to keep in mind is that skipping strange stock symbols from foreign lands would be a mistake. There are many companies on the market with terrible symbols that are seen as opportunities by Wall Street.

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In Wall Street lingo, the act of selecting a stock symbol referred to as a ticker can be considered an art. As a rule of thumb, it should be concise, easily remembered, and remind investors of the company's history.

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It is important to note that some of the good ones include HOG for Harley-Davidson and RACE for Ferrari. It is not uncommon for companies to be interested in single-letter tickers. United States Steel has an X in that category and Citigroup has a C in that category. It is also easy to remember the tickers for companies such as MSFT and AMZN, such as MSFT for Microsoft and AMZN for Amazon.com AMZN -0.49%, for example.

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In addition to this, there are some stocks whose tickers are a mess, such as EADSY for Airbus or NSRGY for Nestle. There are a lot of letters in those five letters and while they are long and hard to memorize, they don't evoke thoughts of the companies they represent.

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As you may be aware, U.S. stock symbols are all for American Depositary Receipts, or ADRs, which are essentially U.S.-listed shares of foreign companies that are listed on the U.S. stock exchange. It is easy for Americans to hold shares of foreign companies in their regular brokerage accounts by purchasing American Depository Receipts (ADRs). They can also be used by investors as a means of diversifying their portfolios geographically.

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They can also be a great way for investors to get first-hand experience with large, high-quality companies that they might not have the chance to select as part of their normal search for investments. In order to come up with some good ideas, Trade Algo looked through all the five-letter symbols on the stock exchanges of the United States. Only ADRs that are needed to trade more than $5 million worth of stock in a given day can be used as a criterion for narrowing the list down. There are a number of ADRs that are difficult to own due to the fact that they rarely trade.

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As a result, we identified 10 that appear to be of interest.

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Those who are interested in investing can grab a pen and paper and prepare to take notes. There might be a need for a quick reference guide to help them remember tickers such as telecom company Teleperformance (TLPFY), Chinese electric vehicle maker and Tesla (TSLA) rival BYD 1211 –3.53%  (BYDDY), pharmaceutical giant Lonza (LZAGY), budget airline Ryanair (RYAAY), materials giant Glencore (GLNCY), semiconductor maker Infineon (IFNNY), luxury goods giant LVMH Moet Hennessey Louis Vuitton (LVMUY) and industrial conglomerate Siemens (SIEGY).

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There are six countries represented and several industries represented as well. On average, the 10 stocks trade at a price that is 17 times the estimated earnings for 2023. Although there is a wide range of prices, there is still a lot of variation. At the top, there is a company called Lonza, which trades for about 35 times what it earns. Mercedes is trading for about six times its earnings at the bottom of the list.

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The one thing that all 10 of them have in common is the strong support they receive from local analysts. In general, the average Buy-rating ratio for the 10 companies is about 86%. According to the S&P 500 SPX -0.16%, around 58% of stocks in the S&P 500 SPX -0.16% have a Buy rating.

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Among the 10 stocks, the average market capitalization is more than $100 billion, and over the last 12 months, the 10 stocks have fallen by an average of about 4% over the past year. In the same period of time, the S&P 500 and the Dow Jones Industrial AverageDJIA -0.08% have lost about 8% and 3%, respectively, compared to the same period last year.

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The idea of starting with stock symbols might seem like an odd place to start, but good ideas can come from anywhere. There is also a tendency for U.S. investors to overly focus on companies based in the United States. There is no doubt that their portfolios could do with a little international flavor.

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The following 10 companies with five-letter tickers should be considered by intrepid investors who are seeking out new ideas from other parts of the world.

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As with any investment process, a stock screen is only the beginning of the process, and nothing more. It's a way of taking a fresh look at a certain sector or style and narrowing down what stocks you can invest in so that you have a manageable list of investible stocks. It is only after this screen that the work of learning about and valuing individual companies gets started.