The Wendy’s Company (WEN)

I quite like the business model of certain restaurant stocks like Wendy’s (WEN). The fast food firm is essentially a giant rent collector, albeit one in which rent is tied to the sale of hamburgers and fries. Around 95% of its 6,814 restaurants operate on a franchised basis as per the firm’s most recent 10-Q. I guess that makes the Ohio-based company somewhat comparable to…

There are a handful of stocks I follow that are almost impossible to justify in terms of valuation. Think York Water Company for instance, a regional utility stock that has the distinction of racking up over two hundred years of consecutive dividend payments. It trades for 45x net earnings! Another company that looks like it qualifies for that basket is well known hamburger chain Wendy’s…