At the end of every quarter, I like to look back over recent market laggards. Most of the stocks that took a recent deep hit are likely to stay depressed, but some are the victim of investor over-reaction and poised for a rebound. With that in mind, let’s look at the five worst-performing small caps during the past month. All of these stocks are in the Russell 2000 Index of small caps, and each sport a market value of at least $300 million. Read More

At the end of every quarter, I like to look back over recent market laggards. Most of the stocks that took a recent deep hit are likely to stay depressed, but some are the victim of investor over-reaction and poised for a rebound. With that in mind, let’s look at the five worst-performing small caps during the past month. All of these stocks are in the Russell 2000 Index of small caps, and each sport a market value of at least $300 million. Savient Pharmaceuticals (Nasdaq: SVNT) This biotech soared +83% in the third quarter. Roughly a third of that gain came on just one day in September when it received FDA approval for Krystexxa, a gout drug which targets patients for which other gout treatments have proven ineffective. Some analysts think Krystexxa represents $200-250 million in annual sales, while others peg it as a $750 million annual revenue opportunity. Global Hunter Securities figures the market niche is roughly $400 million. Savient announced back in May that it would put itself up for sale, and the FDA… Read More

About a week ago, a press release announced that the University of Virginia Press would be making tens of thousands of writings and documents from the nation’s Founding Fathers available on the Internet. By 2012, instead of having to rely on what was written about George Washington or Thomas Jefferson, individuals will be able to read their original thoughts on many important subjects. The news is of obvious excitement to historians and other history buffs, but also serves as yet another indication of the growing importance of digital technology to businesses and society as a whole. Websites… Read More

About a week ago, a press release announced that the University of Virginia Press would be making tens of thousands of writings and documents from the nation’s Founding Fathers available on the Internet. By 2012, instead of having to rely on what was written about George Washington or Thomas Jefferson, individuals will be able to read their original thoughts on many important subjects. The news is of obvious excitement to historians and other history buffs, but also serves as yet another indication of the growing importance of digital technology to businesses and society as a whole. Websites and social networks are other examples and mean continued leaps in demand for storing and retrieving increasing amounts of digital content. Tech giant Cisco (Nasdaq: CSCO) frequently talks about “the human network,” which it defines the most important asset in the information technology (IT) industry. It defines this network as “the platform to change the way the world works, lives, plays, and learns.” This statement definitely may be advertising fluff, but it also happens to be a good way to identify the vast array of markets the firm’s products address to make it a reality. Read More

The Russell 2000 index is widely seen as a proxy for small cap stocks. Yet the definition of “small cap” can be quite loose. Riverbed Technology (Nasdaq: RVBD), the Russell 2000’s largest component, is worth more than $4 billion, while a number of members of the index are worth less than $200 million. Historically, the biggest names in this index eventually graduate, often to the S&P 500, where they become one of the smaller companies in this large company index. Such a… Read More

The Russell 2000 index is widely seen as a proxy for small cap stocks. Yet the definition of “small cap” can be quite loose. Riverbed Technology (Nasdaq: RVBD), the Russell 2000’s largest component, is worth more than $4 billion, while a number of members of the index are worth less than $200 million. Historically, the biggest names in this index eventually graduate, often to the S&P 500, where they become one of the smaller companies in this large company index. Such a move often triggers a nice little gain, as index funds need to buy up shares of any new S&P 500 entrants to ensure that they own the whole portfolio. So which stocks are most likely to graduate and matriculate upwards? Let’s take a look. The candidates To gain inclusion in the S&P 500, decision-makers at Standard & Poor’s like to ensure that new entrants have a reasonable level of current business and a bright future. Here’s a look at the top 10 companies in the Russell… Read More

In the healthcare industry, when it comes to pharmaceutical drugs, the focus is usually on the major pharmaceutical companies (like Merck (NYSE: MRK) and Johnson & Johnson (NYSE: JNJ)) that produce the drugs, and the retailers (like CVS (NYSE: CVS) and Walgreen (NYSE: WAG)) that sell them on store shelves… Read More

Microsoft (Nasdaq: MSFT) is a compelling investment. Analysts expect the software giant’s stock to return +70% to +110% during the next three or four years. Furthermore, its current price-to-earnings ratio (P/E) of 12 looks cheap next to its five-year average P/E… Read More

Look around the room you are in. I guarantee there’s at least a dozen devices powered by electricity, and of those, at least a few are powered by batteries. Batteries — or in more precise terms, energy storage devices — have remained pretty much unchanged… Read More

From time to time, the banking sector will see a transformative innovation, such as the ATM or online banking. But it often takes time to get consumers to change their habits. Yet when it happens, the results can be a big money maker. This appears to… Read More

It’s time to write the obituary for traditional cell phones. Apple (Nasdaq: AAPL) has changed the game with its iPhone, and there are now a raft of other smartphones on the market as well. My favorite play on this theme is Synaptics (Nasdaq: SYNA), which was a… Read More

My colleague David Sterman recently wrote a piece about the challenges investors face when they spot a company they would love to own, but the stock is just too darn expensive. [Read Dave’s article here] The basic takeaway is to keep a close eye on the stock in hopes that an opportunity arises to pick it up at a more appealing valuation. About a decade ago, a specialty apparel retailer had a stock that qualified as a small cap and flew under the radar screen of most investors. Read More

My colleague David Sterman recently wrote a piece about the challenges investors face when they spot a company they would love to own, but the stock is just too darn expensive. [Read Dave’s article here] The basic takeaway is to keep a close eye on the stock in hopes that an opportunity arises to pick it up at a more appealing valuation. About a decade ago, a specialty apparel retailer had a stock that qualified as a small cap and flew under the radar screen of most investors. But between about 2003 and 2006, the market began to take note of its stellar growth prospects, and sent the shares up more than ten-fold. Like Dave describes in his article, I thought I missed the boat, as the stock has risen only slightly and the valuation has remained rich, which means there have been only a few brief opportunities to pick up the shares on the cheap. One of those opportunity exists now, because the stock is bumping along its lows of the past year, which I atribte simply to… Read More

Investing would be so much easier with a time machine. A person could simply go back in time and buy today’s industry behemoths while they were still just up and coming regular companies. Too bad there’s no such thing as a time machine. However,… Read More