1 Magnificent S&P 500 Dividend Stock Down 27% to Buy and Hold Forever

• This banal hasn't been immune to weakness permeating the user staples sector.

• It sports a dividend output good successful excess of U.S. Treasuries and the payout is rising.

• The banal is inexpensive and could supply buffering if marketplace volatility spikes successful 2026.

• 10 stocks we similar amended than General Mills ›

For a 3rd consecutive year, consumer-packaged goods stocks volition lag the S&P 500. The sector's weakness is truthful palpable that a surface of S&P 500 members yielding a minimum of 3% and down astatine slightest 10% this twelvemonth yields 11 staple names. That's 11 retired of 42 stocks that acceptable that bill.

General Mills (NYSE: GIS) is 1 of those offenders and an egregious 1 astatine that, arsenic highlighted by a 2025 diminution of 27.19%. Combine that weakness with enthusiasm for artificial quality (AI) and different glamorous investing segments, and, understandably, marketplace participants are leery of dating General Mills, fto unsocial marrying the stock.

The institution isn't taking marketplace capitalization erosion lightly. It's making demand-juicing terms investments crossed immoderate of its brands, which are paying dividends successful the signifier of improved income and volumes. More moves to that effect could lend to a rebound, but funny investors apt request to widen General Mills immoderate latitude.

Investors considering General Mills arsenic a buy-and-hold thought are close to request much than anticipation the banal has fallen truthful overmuch that a rebound is the adjacent logical step. There's nary specified happening arsenic a definite stake successful investing, but the Cheerios shaper has immoderate encouraging cardinal factors.

Part of the crushed the shares tumbled is that the ready-to-eat cereal market, wherever General Mills is simply a ascendant participant, isn't a high-growth segment. Plus, user tastes are shifting. Today's on-the-go families aren't arsenic cereal-devoted arsenic were their predecessors. That's not an alarm doorbell for General Mills due to the fact that it has brands, including Nature Valley, that are leveraged for quicker meal fixes. In fact, Nature Valley controls astir a 4th of the home cereal barroom market.

Additionally, General Mills isn't human-dependent. It's the institution down Blue Buffalo favored food, and portion that's not a glamorous class either, that marque is the person successful canine nutrient and 1 of the apical names successful feline food. Those positions are applicable to investors due to the fact that pet owners are often brand-loyal; erstwhile they find a marque their pets like, they thin to instrumentality with it.

General Mills is besides eyeing a determination into caller favored food, which, comparative to the category, is simply a higher-octane segment. People are eating healthier, and if they judge they tin widen their pets' lives by switching to caller food, galore owners volition marque the move, adjacent if it costs more.