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Posted
Oct 12 2007, 11:22 AM
by
Matt Koppenheffer
Rating:
Money Blog: Top Stocks Blog - MSN Money
Many investors were likely grinding their teeth yesterday, as the markets shed early gains to drop firmly into the red. Like Danny Bonaduce tossing Jonny Fairplay over his head, the indices took a turn for the ugly and didn't look back.
But not everyone was wincing. In the CAPS community today, CAPS player EPS100Momentum writes "thank god for yesterday's correction," adding that the drop presented good opportunities to pick up stocks that had gotten a little too hot.
He specifically points out China Finance Online, which fell 11% yesterday. China Finance may be a questionable example, though, since the stock carries a lousy one-star rating on CAPS. Many of CAPS' top players have been solidly negative on the stock -- including chk999, who thinks that it's part of a bubble in its native country
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Posted
Oct 15 2007, 11:23 AM
by
Matt Koppenheffer
Rating:
Money Blog: Top Stocks Blog - MSN Money
For the first time today, oil broke above $85 per barrel, partly due to the threat of yet more violence in the Middle East. Now I'm not going to argue that $85 per barrel is a catastrophic increase over, say, $80 per barrel -- though 6% is nothing to sneeze at -- but it's just stacking onto the incredible rise of crude oil over the past few years. According to nominal oil price data from the Department of Energy, a price of $85 would mean that crude oil is up an amazing 393%, or roughly 17% per year, since 1997.
As investors, we can look at this from the perspective of how much the continued rise will hurt the bottom line for a broad range of companies like Wal-Mart, JB Hunt, and Southwest Airlines.
On the other hand, we can also spend our time looking at the companies that are expected to continue to benefit from the amazing surge in oil prices. To get some ideas, I tapped the CAPS community and looked at a few different sub-segments of the oil industry
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Posted
Oct 22 2007, 12:40 PM
by
Matt Koppenheffer
Money Blog: Top Stocks Blog - MSN Money
After a week of fairly consistent negative coverage of the banking sector, investors can likely find a boatload of reasons why they should avoid bank stocks. From the big guys like Citigroup and Bank of America to some of the relatively smaller names like Washington Mutual, the industry has been looking downright sorry.
But is it time to write off any stock that sports the word "bank" in its description? Players in the CAPS community seem to think not. That's not to say that they have a radically higher opinion of the major banks I mentioned above -- out of a possible five stars Bank of America has a middling three star rating, while Citigroup and WaMu both sport two stars. They're not any more positive on the big investment banks either. Goldman Sachs has been rated three stars, but Morgan Stanley, Lehman Brothers, and Bear Stearns all carry two stars or less.
Looking outside of the US, though, CAPS players have identified a number of foreign banking stocks they think are worth of a full five star rating.
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Posted
Oct 23 2007, 12:15 PM
by
Matt Koppenheffer
Rating:
Money Blog: Top Stocks Blog - MSN Money
Though the baseball/investing analogy has gotten a lot of mileage, it's always been one of my favorites. And in the spirit of the World Series, I thought I'd take a look at my favorite piece of that analogy: swing hard at fat pitches.
In baseball, if you swing at anything that comes in your direction you have a pretty good chance of striking out a heck of a lot. Even if you do happen to make contact here and there, your chances aren't all that good of getting the sweet spot of the bat on the ball.
In investing it’s a similar deal -- if you buy stocks indiscriminately, there's a good chance you'll be unhappy with the results. However, if you hold out for stocks that are great businesses selling at great prices, you will likely goose the ol' investing slugging percentage.
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Posted
Oct 24 2007, 03:13 PM
by
Matt Koppenheffer
Rating:
Money Blog: Top Stocks Blog - MSN Money
Stock ratings on CAPS favor those companies that CAPS players are unanimously bullish on. This is why a stock like Ford, which has a bull/bear split of 56% / 44%, ends up with a lowly one star rating.
One star or not, though, there are still 1,755 players on CAPS that are bullish on Ford. Why you ask? Good question. The prevailing wisdom on the bullish side seems to be that Ford:
1) Is too big / established / important to go bankrupt.
2) Its new cars are going to help it turn the corner.
3) The stock is cheap at the current price.
Now I'm all about a cheap stock, but I definitely fall on same side of the line as CAPS player PSRUDY, who quipped "Henry would not be pleased with what you've done!"
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Posted
Oct 26 2007, 10:13 AM
by
Matt Koppenheffer
Rating:
Money Blog: Top Stocks Blog - MSN Money
Countrywide Financial may have lost $1.2 billion during its third quarter, but as we all know, Wall Street is always looking to the future. So what's in the cards for Countrywide going forward? According to Countrywide's President, profitability. He said that after swallowing its first quarterly loss in the past 25 years, Countrywide expects to be back in the black next quarter.
Investors are going bananas over the projection for next quarter, and as of this writing the stock is up almost 17% on the day.
Players on The Motley Fool's CAPS don't seem quite as convinced. At one star, the stock is at the bottom of the barrel as far as CAPS ratings go. The projections for next quarter didn't seem to help much -- 34 of the 47 new players to rate Countrywide today were bearish on the stock. One CAPS player, devoish, warned that he "[believes] there is more bad news coming beyond just today's layoffs and writedowns."
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Posted
Oct 29 2007, 07:59 PM
by
Matt Koppenheffer
Rating:
Money Blog: Top Stocks Blog - MSN Money
So what'll it be: the hawks or the doves? Inflation fighting or economy stoking? That's right, we're coming up on another Fed meeting and the bets are pouring in. Based on a strong Monday for stocks, it looks like the market is getting ready for another interest rate cut following September's surprise half-point cut.
Bloggers on The Motley Fool's CAPS service are already analyzing the situation and giving their predictions on what the Fed will be doing come Wednesday. One blogger, loriyacht, thinks that the Fed will be too focused on inflation and the yet rising price of oil, and as a result will hold off on another rate cut.
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Posted
Oct 30 2007, 03:16 PM
by
Matt Koppenheffer
Rating:
Money Blog: Top Stocks Blog - MSN Money
So after he oversaw $8 billion-plus in losses at Merrill Lynch and shopped a merger with Wachovia without consulting his own board, Stan O'Neal is officially out of the CEO spot. At least he'll have plenty of time to tweak his golf game now. Oh no, wipe away those tears -- ol' Stan, he won't be on the ramen noodle diet any time soon.
While the troubles of other struggling firms like Bear Stearns, Citigroup, and Bank of America have faded into the background to some extent as Merrill's shenanigans have taken center stage, they're not gone. Even Merrill, which may elicit the reaction of "how much worse can it really get" might get a bit worse. Deutsche Bank analyst Mike Mayo, who's been really turning the screws on the management teams at the banks, suggests that new management might get even more conservative and write off as much as $4 billion more.
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Posted
Oct 31 2007, 04:51 PM
by
Matt Koppenheffer
Rating:
Money Blog: Top Stocks Blog - MSN Money
KB Home is down 51% from its high for the year. And it's not alone.
Beazer Homes: down 77%
Levitt Corp: down 88%
TOUSA: off 94%
I could continue.
Are there any homebuilders out there that are still worth the paper that their stock certificates are printed on? On The Motley Fool's CAPS service, blogger floridabuilder -- an insider in the industry -- suggests that there are a handful that will be winners if we avoid a full-on recession.
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Posted
Nov 02 2007, 02:11 PM
by
Matt Koppenheffer
Rating:
Money Blog: Top Stocks Blog - MSN Money
It's been a challenging decade for the airlines. The 2001 terrorist attacks body slammed the industry, employee relations have been less than stellar as they try to cut costs, and the seemingly unstoppable price of oil continues to crimp business. American Airlines and Delta just pushed through some price hikes aimed at offsetting the rocketing price of jet fuel, and United and Southwest did some of the same last month.
For investors, the question is whether there is opportunity to be found in the face of these headwinds. On The Motley Fool's CAPS service, players are split on the prospects for Southwest, a long-time favorite among investors. Though there are fair number of Southwest bulls, the stock has just a two star rating -- suggesting that it's not among the best investment opportunities in the 5,000-stock CAPS universe.
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