Heading off early next week ahead of the Labor Day weekend? So are many others, including Wall Street traders. As they leave their trading desks, trading volumes can get awfully light. That makes the markets vulnerable — on the upside or the downside — to any news items that are unexpected. With a dearth of corporate news but a boatload of economic releases next week, investors need to stay vigilant. Here’s a look at four key items to watch: 1) On Tuesday, August 30th, we’ll get the latest reading from the monthly Case-Shiller home… Read More

Heading off early next week ahead of the Labor Day weekend? So are many others, including Wall Street traders. As they leave their trading desks, trading volumes can get awfully light. That makes the markets vulnerable — on the upside or the downside — to any news items that are unexpected. With a dearth of corporate news but a boatload of economic releases next week, investors need to stay vigilant. Here’s a look at four key items to watch: 1) On Tuesday, August 30th, we’ll get the latest reading from the monthly Case-Shiller home price index. The data reflects June prices, and this report is coming off a surprisingly robust tally the prior month that showed a +4.6% gain in home prices in May. In fact, this report has looked a tad better for 15 straight months, after bottoming with an -18% drop in February, 2009. Many of those ensuing months were still negative, but less so as time passed. Now, with a string of three straight positive readings, can we keep it up? Any reading above +5.0% would be a real positive for the markets and could boost housing stocks. Then again,… Read More

Investors that look to short stocks seek out two kinds of investments: those that are simply overvalued, and those that may go out of business. The latter are known as a “terminal short,” (as in terminally ill), and though they are rare, they can be very profitable. Parsing TiVo’s (Nasdaq: TIVO) fiscal second quarter results that were released Wednesday evening, you’ll find a company that is beginning to lose altitude. And as you look out into the future of TV and Internet programming, it’s hard to see how the company will… Read More

Investors that look to short stocks seek out two kinds of investments: those that are simply overvalued, and those that may go out of business. The latter are known as a “terminal short,” (as in terminally ill), and though they are rare, they can be very profitable. Parsing TiVo’s (Nasdaq: TIVO) fiscal second quarter results that were released Wednesday evening, you’ll find a company that is beginning to lose altitude. And as you look out into the future of TV and Internet programming, it’s hard to see how the company will remain as a compelling choice for either consumers or its media partners. Back in the red As young companies like TiVo are in growth mode, they are excused from the need to show positive cash flow. The company’s sales rose nicely through the middle of the past decade, but growth sharply slowed in fiscal (January) 2008 and has since turned negative. Trouble is, the company was only able to generate positive cash flow in fiscal 2009, but is once again back in negative cash flow mode. That’s worrisome enough. TiVo’s… Read More

Investors see little reason to buy any stocks having to do with housing right now, and for good reason. Recent data tell us that the long-awaited upturn in housing is still over the horizon. So shares prices — especially among home furnishing retailers — fall and fall some more. In the last three months, shares of Kirkland’s (Nasdaq: KIRK) have lost almost half of their value, Haverty’s (NYSE: HVT) and Ethan Allen (NYSE: ETH) have fallen by roughly one-third, while Bed, Bath & Beyond (Nasdaq: BBBY) and Pier One Imports (NYSE: PIR) have… Read More

Investors see little reason to buy any stocks having to do with housing right now, and for good reason. Recent data tell us that the long-awaited upturn in housing is still over the horizon. So shares prices — especially among home furnishing retailers — fall and fall some more. In the last three months, shares of Kirkland’s (Nasdaq: KIRK) have lost almost half of their value, Haverty’s (NYSE: HVT) and Ethan Allen (NYSE: ETH) have fallen by roughly one-third, while Bed, Bath & Beyond (Nasdaq: BBBY) and Pier One Imports (NYSE: PIR) have fallen roughly -20%. One could assume the sell-off was the result of steadily falling profit estimates, yet consensus expectations for Bed, Bath & Beyond’s profit in 2010 and 2011 have remained flat in the past three months, and Pier One’s profit outlook has actually been strengthening. (Ethan Allen and Haverty’s, which focus on more expensive bedroom and living room sets, have been the subject of downward estimate revisions). As the table below shows, these stocks now range from reasonably priced to dirt cheap. Company (Ticker) Recent… Read More

One of the realities of a tough market is that fully-priced stocks get discounted, and under-priced stocks become really, really cheap. You can forget about the notion that stocks always deserve to trade at whatever price they currently have — known as the Efficient-Market Hypothesis. Often times, the market is… Read More

Lost in all of this spring’s hand-wringing about the potentially negative impacts from President Obama’s health care overhaul, investors seemed to overlook two more powerful forces that could severely impact the health care industry. Consumers’ financial distress is leading to a sharp slowdown in elective medical procedures (as my colleague… Read More

It’s an old investing axiom that you can make money when stocks are hated. The rule also applies to the broader stock market and beaten-down sectors. It always pays to check out stocks and sectors that have sharply fallen to see if emotion-based selling has pushed them so far down… Read More

Investors in 3PAR (NYSE: PAR) can’t believe their good fortune. They woke up last Monday to find that their investment had nearly doubled in value after Dell (Nasdaq: DELL) announced plans to buy the data storage company. And this Monday morning, they got another gift when Hewlett-Packard (NYSE: HPQ) announced… Read More

As tech stocks were exploding in the late 1990s, companies offering video conferencing technology were all the rage. Investors assumed that all business meetings would eventually be replaced by video and audio feeds, allowing for virtual face-to-face collaboration. A decade later, the industry has made major inroads (if not completely… Read More

Over the next few quarters, look for Google (Nasdaq: GOOG) to keep up the pressure on Apple (Nasdaq: AAPL) as it enters the music download business, strengthens the Android software platform’s capabilities, and likely rolls out a few new technologies and services we have not yet heard about. [Read: Apple’s… Read More

As the market grinds down toward the end of the summer, we’re seeing the typical seasonal malaise when a number of good companies quietly drift down to 52-week lows. And the selling may not be over. The S&P 500 has historically been the weakest in September, dropping an average of -1.3%. The good news: stocks really build a head of steam after that. The S&P 500 typically rises +0.7% in October, followed by average monthly gains of +1.5%, +1.9% and +2.1% in each of the next three months. Savvy investors always keep some cash on hand for… Read More

As the market grinds down toward the end of the summer, we’re seeing the typical seasonal malaise when a number of good companies quietly drift down to 52-week lows. And the selling may not be over. The S&P 500 has historically been the weakest in September, dropping an average of -1.3%. The good news: stocks really build a head of steam after that. The S&P 500 typically rises +0.7% in October, followed by average monthly gains of +1.5%, +1.9% and +2.1% in each of the next three months. Savvy investors always keep some cash on hand for these summer doldrums, as it can be a fertile time to start researching unloved stocks that should find new appreciation as summer turns to fall. Here are four names hitting new 52-week lows on Friday that should be quite appealing for long-term investors. MedcoHealth Solutions (NYSE: MHS) Earlier this summer, we saw a considerable dust-up between CVS (NYSE: CVS) and Walgreen (NYSE: WAG) as those two firms fought over a pharmacy benefits manager (PBM) contract. As we looked into the PBM sector in June, we saw still-considerable growth prospects,… Read More