What can you expect from a stock fund? That depends on how bullish the fund is, and whether you get a bull or a bear market next. Funds that are at the head of the class when stock prices are going up are likely to do worst when prices are headed down. Defensive funds that lag in bull markets do the best in bear ones.
That dichotomy is behind the fund rating system that Forbes has used since the early 1960s. We award separate performance grades for bull and bear markets. We think it�� more informative than the usual straight-line performance history.
Here�� what�� wrong with just comparing funds over some fixed number of years: Unless your measurement period happens to cover a full market cycle, it�� likely to give you a very distorted view of the abilities of the fund manager. Just now a five-year performance comparison would make any high-risk fund look devilishly clever. But that sort of fund is likely to get killed in the next correction
To grade funds, we look at what happened over two full cycles of up and down markets. That takes us back to August 2000. There are 942 funds buying predominantly U.S. stocks that have been around long enough to be evaluated this way. (Funds with less than $50 million of assets are excluded.)
Hot Valued Stocks To Invest In 2015: ValueClick Inc.(VCLK)
ValueClick, Inc. provides various products and services that enable marketers to advertise and sell their products through online marketing channels primarily in the United States and the United Kingdom. The company?s Affiliate Marketing segment provides technology platforms, advertising network, and customer services, which enable advertisers to create their own commissioned online sales force comprising third-party Website publishers. This segment offers its services under the Commission Junction brand. Its Media segment provides digital marketing services and tailored programs under ValueClick Media brand name that enable marketers to create and increase awareness for their products and brands; attract visitors; and generate leads and sales through the Internet and mobile applications. The company?s Owned & Operated Websites segment offers its services through various Websites comprising Pricerunner and Smarter.com Websites, which enable consumers to research and comp are products from online and/or offline merchants; Couponmountain.com Website that enables consumers to locate coupons and deals related to products and services; and Investopedia.com Website, which provides information on various financial and investment topics, including a proprietary dictionary of financial terms. This segment also operates vertical content Websites that offer consumers information and reference material in various topics in healthcare, finance, travel, home and garden, education, and business services. Its Technology segment operates as an application service provider and offers technology infrastructure tools and consultative services that enable marketers to implement and manage their online display advertising, search engine marketing, and email campaigns. The company serves direct marketers, advertisers, advertising agencies, and traffic distribution partners. ValueClick, Inc. was founded in 1998 and is headquartered in Westlake Village, California.< /p> Advisors' Opinion:
- [By Brian Pacampara]
What: Shares of digital marketing company ValueClick (NASDAQ: VCLK ) plummeted 17% today after its quarterly results and outlook disappointed Wall Street.
- [By Rich Smith]
ValueClick got toggled off
Google's�mini-rival in the market for online ads, ValueClick (NASDAQ: VCLK ) , beat earnings by a couple of cents in yesterday's earnings report. Unfortunately, this good news isn't translating into good grades on Wall Street, as a whole series of analysts cut their ratings on the stock to various flavors of "hold." Stephens and Cantor Fitzgerald, Craig-Hallum and Raymond James -- one and all, the analysts are downgrading ValueClick today -- but why?
Top Defensive Stocks To Own For 2014: Universal Health Services Inc. (UHS)
Universal Health Services, Inc., through its subsidiaries, owns and operates acute care hospitals, behavioral health centers, surgical hospitals, ambulatory surgery centers, and radiation oncology centers. The company�s hospitals offer various services comprising general and specialty surgery, internal medicine, obstetrics, emergency room care, radiology, oncology, diagnostic care, coronary care, pediatric services, pharmacy services, and/or behavioral health services. As of February 24, 2012, it owned and/or operated 25 acute care hospitals and 198 behavioral health centers located in 36 states, Puerto Rico, and the U.S. Virgin Islands, as well as Washington, D.C. The company also operates six surgical hospitals, and surgery and radiation oncology centers located in four states and Puerto Rico. Universal Health Services, Inc. was founded in 1978 and is headquartered in King of Prussia, Pennsylvania.
Advisors' Opinion:- [By Rich Duprey]
Hospital chain operator�Universal Health Services� (NYSE: UHS ) announced today its third-quarter dividend of $0.05 per share, the same rate it's paid since 2010.
- [By Lee Jackson]
Universal Health Services Inc. (NYSE: UHS) is well liked at J.P. Morgan, as coverage expansion under reform provides a substantial boost in 2014. The company’s focus is on behavioral health, which is in a comparatively more attractive position over acute care, the differentiating degree of diversification with behavioral health providers and its market leadership within acute care facilities in high-growth areas. The bottom line is mental health is a growing field. The J.P. Morgan target is raised from $74 to $86.
Top Defensive Stocks To Own For 2014: Yum! Brands Inc.(YUM)
YUM! Brands, Inc., together with its subsidiaries, operates as a quick service restaurant company in the United States and internationally. It develops, operates, franchises, and licenses a system of restaurants, which prepare, package, and sell various food items, as well as operates Chinese casual dining concept restaurants. The company?s restaurants specialize in chicken, pizza, and Mexican-style food categories. It operates approximately 37,000 restaurants in 110 countries and territories under the KFC, Pizza Hut, and Taco Bell brands, as well as approximately 450 casual dining concept restaurants in China. The company was formerly known as TRICON Global Restaurants, Inc. and changed its name to YUM! Brands, Inc. in May 2002. YUM! Brands, Inc. was founded in 1997 and is headquartered in Louisville, Kentucky.
Advisors' Opinion:- [By Jake L'Ecuyer]
Top Headline
Yesterday, Yum! Brands (NYSE: YUM) reported better-than-expected fourth-quarter earnings. Yum Brands posted its quarterly profit of $321 million, or $0.70 per share, versus a year-ago profit of $337 million, or $0.72 per share. Excluding one-time items, Yum earned $0.86 per share. Its total revenue climbed 1% to $4.18 billion versus $4.15 billion. - [By Adam Levine-Weinberg]
Claims of customer mistreatment can quickly lead to a broad-based consumer backlash in China. As a result, some shareholders -- like my colleague Tamara Rutter -- have worried that Starbucks could take a big hit in China, just as Yum! Brands (NYSE: YUM ) did following revelations about abnormally high levels of antibiotics in KFC China's chickens. This would be a big loss for Starbucks, which views China as a massive growth market that will soon be second only to the U.S. in revenue.
- [By Bloomberg Businessweek]
Alamy McDonald's (MCD) may recently have struggled to lure customers, but it still does far more business at each location than rival burger chains. The average McDonald's restaurant in the U.S. drew $2.6 million in revenue last year. Average sales for No. 2 chain Burger King (BKW): $1.2 million, according to data from its largest franchisee, Carrols Restaurant Group (TAST). What accounts for this more-than-a-million gap? "Everything from marketing and site selection to product initiatives and franchisee selection have been historical factors," said Nick Setyan, vice president in charge of equity research at Wedbush Securities, in an email. Here are four factors that drive higher sales volumes at McDonald's: 1. McDonald's gets more customers during off-peak hours. Look no further than the strength of its breakfast business relative that of Burger King, says Darren Tristano, executive vice president at restaurant consultancy Technomic. Egg McMuffin is part of the fast-food vocabulary in a way Burger King can't match. And beverage and snack offerings such as McCafe and wraps have helped increase McDonald's sales between meals. The dramatic impact from off-peak business explains why chains such as Taco Bell (YUM) are entering the battle for morning customers, while others such as Starbucks (SBUX) are seeking more afternoon and evening business. 2. The power of the Happy Meal. McDonald's has the largest share of kids meal sales in the fast-food industry and gets about 10 percent of total sales from Happy Meals, the most commonly advertised child-oriented fast-food item on television. Burger King, meanwhile, is still trying to win back "parties with kids and seniors and women," said Josh Kobza, Burger King's chief financial officer, at a conference last year. One way to do that: "We got rid of the creepy king character that tended to scare away women and children." 3. McDonald's has an edge on efficiency. Despite recent operational challenges at McDonald's,
Top Defensive Stocks To Own For 2014: Vantiv Inc (VNTV)
Vantiv, Inc., formerly Advent-Kong Blocker Corp., incorporated on March 25, 2009, is a holding company that conducts its operations through its majority-owned subsidiaries, Vantiv Holding, LLC (Vantiv Holding) and Transactive Ecommerce Solutions Inc. (Transactive). The Company held 50.9% interest in the subsidiaries. The Company operates in two segments: Merchant Services and Financial Institution Services. The Company provides electronic payment processing services to merchants and financial institutions throughout the United States of America. The Company markets its services through diverse distribution channels, including a direct sales force, relationships with a range of independent sales organizations (ISOs), merchant banks, value-added resellers and trade associations as well as arrangements with core processors. In December 2012, the Company acquired Litle & Co.
The Company provides small and mid-sized clients with the solutions. In addition, it takes a consultative approach to providing services that help its clients enhance their payments-related services. The Company is also providing payment solutions for markets, such as prepaid, ecommerce and mobile payment offerings, because it processes payment transactions across the entire payment processing value chain on a single platform. The Company distributes its services through direct and indirect distribution channels. Its direct channel includes a national sales force that targets financial institutions and national merchants, regional and mid-market sales teams that sell solutions to merchants and third-party reseller clients and a telesales operation that targets small and mid-sized merchants. Its indirect channel to merchants includes relationships with a range of ISOs, merchant banks, value-added resellers and trade associations that target merchants, including small and mid-sized merchants. Its indirect channel to financial institutions includes relationships with third-party resellers and core processors.
M! erchant Services
The Company provides a suite of payment processing services, including acquiring and processing transactions, value-added services and merchant services for banks and credit unions. The Company authorizes, clears, settles and provides reporting for electronic payment transactions for its merchant services clients. Its client base includes over 400,000 merchant locations. The Company enables merchants of all sizes to accept and process credit, debit and prepaid payments and provide them supporting services, such as information solutions, interchange management and fraud management, as well as vertical-specific solutions in sectors, such as grocery, pharmacy, retail, petroleum and restaurants, including, quick service restaurants (QSRs).
The Company competes with Bank of America Merchant Services, Chase Paymentech Solutions, Elavon Inc., First Data Corporation, Global Payments, Inc., Heartland Payment Systems, Inc. and WorldPay US, Inc.
Financial Institution Services
The Company provides integrated card issuer processing, payment network processing and value-added services to financial institutions. Its services include a suite of transaction processing capabilities, including fraud protection, card production, prepaid cards and automated teller machine (ATM) driving and allow financial institutions to offer electronic payments solutions to their customers on a technology platform. The Company serves a diverse set of financial institutions, including regional banks, community banks, credit unions and regional personal identification number (PIN) debit networks. The Company focuses on small to mid-sized institutions. It provides a turnkey solution to such institutions to enable them to offer payment processing solutions. Its client base includes over 1,300 financial institutions. Its bank clients include Capital One Bank, Fifth Third Bank and First Niagara.
The Company competes with Fidelity National Information Services, ! Inc., Fir! st Data Corporation, Fiserv, Inc., Total System Services, Inc. and Visa Debit Processing Service.
Advisors' Opinion:- [By Seth Jayson]
Calling all cash flows
When you are trying to buy the market's best stocks, it's worth checking up on your companies' free cash flow once a quarter or so, to see whether it bears any relationship to the net income in the headlines. That's what we do with this series. Today, we're checking in on Vantiv (NYSE: VNTV ) , whose recent revenue and earnings are plotted below.
Top Defensive Stocks To Own For 2014: Teck Resources Ltd(TCK)
Teck Resources Limited operates as a diversified mining, mineral processing, and metallurgical company. It is involved in exploring, developing, smelting, refining, safety, environmental protecting, product stewardship, recycling, and researching activities. The company offers zinc and lead concentrates, and copper and molybdenum concentrates; zinc and lead, and alloys in a range of compositions and shapes; specialty metals, such as germanium, indium, and cadmium; and precious metals, including refined silver and gold dore. It also provides materials comprising low alpha lead materials, as well as delivers low alpha tin and copper electroplating anodes for semiconductors and integrated circuits; indium-based paste for thermal interfaces; and metal salt solutions used in the production of solar panels and other plating applications. In addition, Teck Resources Limited offers non-ferrous metal refining, metal alloying and casting, electro-winning and electro-refining, metal distilling, metal atomizing, metal salt producing, and metal recycling services for product development. Further, it provides industrial chemicals comprising copper arsenate, copper sulphate pentahydrate, ferrous granules, molten sulphur, sodium antimonate, sulphur dioxide, and sulphuric acid; ammonium sulphate solution and zinc sulphate solution; steelmaking coal; and fertilizers. The company has exploration operations in various countries of the Americas, the Asia Pacific, Europe, and Africa. Teck Resources Limited holds interest in oil sands development assets; wind power project; and a portfolio of copper, zinc, and gold exploration properties. It also owns interests in approximately 13 mines in Canada, the United States, Chile, and Peru, as well as 1 metallurgical complex in Canada. The company was formerly known as Teck Cominco Limited and changed its name to Teck Resources Limited in April 2009. Teck Resources Limited was founded in 1906 and is headquartered in Vancou ver, Canada.
Advisors' Opinion:- [By Bruce Kennedy]
The Anglo-Australian mining company BHP Billiton (NYSE: BHP) and Canadian firm Teck Resources (NYSE: TCK) also reported no disruptions at their Chilean mining operations ��although some BHP Billiton personnel were evacuated from port facilities during the tsunami warning.
Top Defensive Stocks To Own For 2014: Concur Technologies Inc.(CNQR)
Concur Technologies, Inc. provides integrated travel and expense management solutions for companies of various industries, sizes, and geographies. It offers the Concur Connect platform, a cloud computing software solution primarily on a subscription basis, which enables customers, partners, suppliers, and third-party developers to connect. The company provides various solutions to streamline the travel procurement, itinerary management, expense management, and invoice management processes. Its solutions include online travel procurement solutions, which automate corporate travel booking and processing; itinerary management solutions that enable individual business travelers and their organizations to manage and share travel itinerary information; and automated expense management solutions, which simplify the expense reporting process. The company also offers other value-added and extended services that leverage its integrated cloud offerings, including expense reimbursemen t; expense report auditing services to streamline the process of managing and substantiating expense receipts; business intelligence that enable customers to use captured data to analyze trends, influence budget decisions, improve forecasting, and monitor for fraudulent activity; and invoice management solutions to automate, simplify, and reduce the costs associated with the process of entering, approving, and managing the payment of vendor invoices. In addition, it provides consulting; and various extended services, such as site administration, audit and compliance services, advanced analytics, and customized integration in connection with its integrated travel and expense management solutions. Concur markets and sells its solutions worldwide through direct sales organizations; and indirect distribution channels, such as strategic resellers and referral partners, as well as through its Website. The company was founded in 1993 and is headquartered in Redmond, Washington.
Advisors' Opinion:- [By Matt Jarzemsky]
Salesforce is up 33% year-to-date. Workday Inc.(WDAY) has rallied 38% and expense-accounting software provider Concur Technologies(CNQR) is up 44%, to name a few.
- [By Lee Jackson]
The Lazard trading desk said that active traders may want to look at software stocks that still had unusually high short interest. Those included Concur Technologies (NASDAQ: CNQR), Tangoe Inc. (NASDAQ: TNGO), Jive Software (NASDAQ: JIVE), Marketo Inc. (NASDAQ: MKTO), VeriSign Inc. (NASDAQ: VRSN) and VMware Inc. (NYSE: VMW). Stocks with high short interest can explode to the upside if the company gets back on track and short sellers are forced to cover.
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