December 31, 2012
Keep an Eye on These Five New Drugs in the First Quarter of 2013
 Some drug and biotech companies, including several industry leaders, hope to win US approvals for potential blockbuster treatments during the first three months of 2013. The Food and Drug Administration will make a number of decisions in the first quarter regarding market clearance for experimental medicines. Here are five potential drug approvals scheduled for that period and the reason they’re key to strategies for the companies who developed the therapies. The descriptions are listed in chronological order. The date represents the deadline for the FDA to make a ruling on each drug. Some of these dates can be delayed. January 21 Rytary for Parkinson’s disease is the lead drug candidate for the branded pharmaceutical division of Impax Laboratories (IPXL). Impax is a generic drug maker that’s looking to boost revenue with branded products. In October, the company said it expected (more)…
December 17, 2012
Apple vs. Samsung and/or Google: Which of These Brands is ‘Past Its Prime’?
 When did public perception of Apple (AAPL) start morphing from “Greatest Company on Earth” to “Brand Past Its Prime?” At about the time that Samsung (SSNLF), founded in 1938, started looking like a hot young company. Whatever the perceptions, the two are now locked in a race to the top of mobile technology sales for the all-important holiday season. A report just out From IDC says that Samsung and Apple are leading the competition for mobile technology so far in the holiday season. Samsung is first in market share, at 21.8%, but Apple is tops in value, at $34.1 billion in the third quarter. Both numbers are based on shipments, not sales. Reuters dates the beginning of the change in perceptions of both companies to three months ago. Its report says that Samsung has begun to shed its reputation as a (more)…
December 10, 2012
Not All Dividend Stocks Are Equal: Here’s How to Choose the Winners
 The low, low interest rates of the past several years have placed a premium and emphasis on dividend paying stocks. While this is sound thinking, it’s incomplete. For all but the most unique circumstances, investors want to focus on dividend paying stocks with a track record of consistently increasing their dividend. Principally there are two reasons for this. First, for investors relying on dividends for income, consistent increases are a hedge against inflation. Second, increases in dividends increase your cash on cash returns. For instance if you have a $10,000 position in a company paying $300 annually, and over the course of time this increases to $600, your dividend yield on the original $10,000 of cash invested is now 6%. The chart below shows the dividend champions I’ve identified based on their track record of increasing the amount of cash they return to shareholders. (Click to enlarge) The stocks in the yellow-shaded (more)…
December 3, 2012
How Traders Get Wealthy Playing Apple, RIM, and Gold Stocks
 I know most Apple (AAPL) enthusiasts will be rolling their eyes at this analysis, and that’s fine because the rest of us need people to buy our shares as we unload long positions or sell Apple short. All joking aside, the charts below clearly show some very interesting information you cannot afford to overlook. At minimum, take a quick glance at these charts, which tell the full story on their own. The Four Stages of Apple and Research in Motion (RIMM) Markets are cyclical in nature. There is a constant process of expansion and contraction, rally and decline that continues as the market determines the theoretical fair value of a security. The sum of these moves forms an unquestionable cyclical pattern consistent within all time frames. During a cycle a stock enters different phases of support, from irrational exuberance typically found before its (more)…
November 2, 2012
How Wall Street is Helping Victims of Hurricane Sandy
 Giant American banking institutions such as Bank of America (BAC), JPMorgan Chase (JPM), and Wells Fargo (WFC), have been slammed by customers in recent years for their nickel-and-dime policies such as charging for replacement debit cards or mobile phone deposits, all enacted after Dodd-Frank regulations came into effect. However, in the wake of Hurricane Sandy, one of the most destructive storms ever to hit the East Coast of the US, many banks have decided to waive a slew of bank fees for customers in areas affected. Citigroup (C), Bank of America, and TD Bank (TD), for example, were some of the banks waiving overdraft fees, late fees, and fees incurred for using out-of-network ATM fees through yesterday in storm-hit areas. Chase, Wells Fargo, and PNC (PNC) also waived overdraft fees, though customers at the latter have to contact the bank to get refunds for late fees on consumer and (more)…
October 29, 2012
Why Apple Manufacturing Jobs Aren’t Coming Back to the US
 “Designed by Apple in California. Assembled in China.” Those statements can be found at the back of any iPhone or iPad, as long-time Apple (AAPL) fans will surely know. These words reinforce a commonly-held assumption that explains the weakness of US manufacturing and why Apple doesn’t build its products at home — namely, that the Cupertino, California-based company has outsourced the bulk of its production to China, because American workers are unable to accept the low wages and long hours Chinese employees tolerate. Certainly, there’s been plenty of media coverage this year about the exploitative working conditions at Apple’s assembler-in-chief in China, Foxconn (2038.HK), which also puts together products for other major tech companies such as Samsung (SSNLF), Hewlett-Packard (HPQ), Microsoft (MSFT), and Cisco (CSCO). It’s also true that low-wage, labor-intensive manufacturing jobs will likely never come back to the (more)…
October 8, 2012
Is 1 Billion Users Good or Bad for Facebook?
 Facebook (FB) announced last week that it crossed the 1 billion monthly active user mark in September, putting it just behind oxygen and water in terms of importance to human life here on Earth. But now, the question on everyone’s mind: What does this mean for earnings? Let’s break it down. First, let’s look at what a monthly active user (“MAU”) is. From Facebook’s S-1: We define a monthly active user as a registered Facebook user who logged in and visited Facebook through our website or a mobile device, or took an action to share content or activity with his or her Facebook friends or connections via a third-party website that is integrated with Facebook, in the last 30 days as of the date of measurement. MAUs are a measure of the size of our global active user community, which has (more)…
September 24, 2012
Should Investors Start Taking Money Off the Table?
 Back on June 5, when fear was palpable following a sharp market retreat, I suggested that it was a good time to buy stocks. Since then, the market has advanced an impressive 15%. I hope you got more long exposure to stocks back then, and you’ve enjoyed the upside. Now, however, it’s time to take some money off the table. How so? After all, Europe seems to be stabilizing, and the Fed just announced another round of quantitative easing, or QE3. All of this is reassuring, right? Maybe, but I see four solid reasons for a pullback here. 1) Insiders are turning decidedly bearish. 2) Investors are turning much more bullish, a contrarian signal. Technical indicators support this, suggesting that the market is toppy. 3) Third quarter earnings will show a lot more weakness than many investors expect. 4) The (more)…
September 7, 2012
Whats Does the New ‘Tweets per Minute’ Metric Really Mean?
 “Tweets per minute,” or TPM, has become the It metric of campaign season. That much became obvious yesterday when headlines like “Michelle Obama’s Speech Brings in 28K Tweets per Minute, Destroys Mitt Romney” dominated coverage of opening night at the Democratic National Convention. By comparison, Romney’s speech from Tampa generated about 14,289 TPM in its most Tweet-heavy moments, more than double the 6,195 TPM rate achieved by his wife, Ann. And today the Twitter Blog reports: President Bill Clinton took the stage in Charlotte tonight and fired up Democrats in the arena and on Twitter alike. The 42nd President saw the highest spike in Tweets per minute of the night right at the end of his speech: 22,087. Interestingly, though this peak was higher than @MittRomney’s highest last week in Tampa, Clinton’s was less than @MichelleObama’s peak last night. When did we start talking (more)…
August 24, 2012
10 Undervalued Dividend-Paying Stocks With Momentum
 In these dog days of summer, stocks aren’t moving too much. Here are a few companies in the S&P 500 (SPY) that are could be very good for sitting back and collecting dividends. These 10 companies have a much lower price-to-earnings (P/E) ratio than the average of 17.2 for the S&P 500 index, all have a dividend yield of over 3%, and some have been on a tear this year. 10. Intel (INTC) P/E Ratio: 11.6 Dividend yield: 3.42% One-month performance: +2.65% 9. Eaton Corp. (ETN) P/E Ratio: 11.09 Dividend yield: 3.28% One-month performance: +17.9% 8. ConocoPhillips (COP) P/E Ratio: 11.08 Dividend yield: 4.60% One-month performance: +$1.84 7. Lockheed Martin (LMT) P/E Ratio: 10.82 Dividend yield: 4.33% One-month performance: +6.36% Like General Dynamics (GD) and Northrup Grumman (NOC) listed below, there is some fear out there that defense contracts will (more)…
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