Saying that Apple (Nasdaq: AAPL) is tight-lipped about impending hardware announcements is an understatement. However, that hasn’t stopped the rumor mill from kicking into high gear as the end of the summer approaches.   #-ad_banner-#Apple hasn’t made an official announcement, but there’s heavy speculation that the next generation of “i-” products will be released in the coming months, with the iPhone 6 expected to debut in September.  Other offerings expected to make a debut (either this year or early next) include a thinner and/or larger iPhone iteration, an iWatch, and an updated version of the iPad. The exact names and… Read More

Saying that Apple (Nasdaq: AAPL) is tight-lipped about impending hardware announcements is an understatement. However, that hasn’t stopped the rumor mill from kicking into high gear as the end of the summer approaches.   #-ad_banner-#Apple hasn’t made an official announcement, but there’s heavy speculation that the next generation of “i-” products will be released in the coming months, with the iPhone 6 expected to debut in September.  Other offerings expected to make a debut (either this year or early next) include a thinner and/or larger iPhone iteration, an iWatch, and an updated version of the iPad. The exact names and specs of each of these seems to change with the tides, but Apple fanatics and analysts have long looked to one area to discern exact details about future releases — Apple’s suppliers.   My colleague Marshall Hargrave already let you in on one Apple supplier that’s made a home in some big-name investors’ portfolios. The Cupertino, California-based giant has a few more tricks up its supply-chain sleeve however, and the market has high hopes for the two companies I’ve uncovered going into Apple’s next hardware reveal.  GT Advanced Technologies (Nasdaq: GTAT) GT makes advanced materials for consumer products. Apple has… Read More

Today, one of the best places for value investors is technology. This comes as the share prices of some dot-com-era companies are still below where they were during the boom. #-ad_banner-#While their price-to-earnings (P/E) multiples were in the stratosphere back in 1999, they’re now in the value bin. Some of these durable companies are even trading at P/E’s below that of the S&P 500. This means there’s an opportunity for sophisticated investors to buy some great bargains. Although their share prices might have not climbed much in the past 10 years, their businesses have continued to grow. Today, with their… Read More

Today, one of the best places for value investors is technology. This comes as the share prices of some dot-com-era companies are still below where they were during the boom. #-ad_banner-#While their price-to-earnings (P/E) multiples were in the stratosphere back in 1999, they’re now in the value bin. Some of these durable companies are even trading at P/E’s below that of the S&P 500. This means there’s an opportunity for sophisticated investors to buy some great bargains. Although their share prices might have not climbed much in the past 10 years, their businesses have continued to grow. Today, with their steady businesses, these former high-fliers can almost be considered blue-chip stocks. One company that fits this mold is EMC Corp. (NYSE: EMC). At the height of the dot-com bubble, EMC traded at nearly $100 a share. Today, shares trade near $29, a good 70% off the company’s all-time highs. (It is up 8%, however, since my colleague Joseph Hogue profiled EMC this spring.) EMC is more profitable now than ever, with earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization (EBITDA) of $5.4 billion last year on revenue of $23.6 billion. Shares are trading at just 13 times… Read More

Investors seem to have gotten over the beating that Internet stocks took from early March to early May, when the group plummeted about 20%. Since then, these stocks have rallied nearly 17% and appear to be gaining momentum once again. #-ad_banner-#​Facebook (Nasdaq: FB) has done particularly well, jumping more than 30% from a late-April low of $56 to the current price of almost $75. Following a 15% plunge to $518 in early May, Google (Nasdaq: GOOGL) has made up most of the ground it lost and now trades near $600.  Other well-known Internet stocks have come back strongly,… Read More

Investors seem to have gotten over the beating that Internet stocks took from early March to early May, when the group plummeted about 20%. Since then, these stocks have rallied nearly 17% and appear to be gaining momentum once again. #-ad_banner-#​Facebook (Nasdaq: FB) has done particularly well, jumping more than 30% from a late-April low of $56 to the current price of almost $75. Following a 15% plunge to $518 in early May, Google (Nasdaq: GOOGL) has made up most of the ground it lost and now trades near $600.  Other well-known Internet stocks have come back strongly, too, including travel agent Priceline (Nasdaq: PCLN), retail behemoth Amazon.com (Nasdaq: AMZN) and auction/e-commerce leader eBay (Nasdaq: EBAY).  Those looking to profit from the rebound have the daunting task of deciding which stocks to choose. There are many good ones, but it’s hard to know which. The world of Internet investing is still relatively new and often makes little sense, with stock prices that may seem to based more on hype and unreasonable expectations than solid fundamentals. Basically, it’s just too easy to make the wrong picks and get burned, even if you do your homework. That’s why in this… Read More

As kids, we’re taught that “you can’t have your cake and eat it too.”  #-ad_banner-#There’s always a trade-off, always an opportunity cost to forgo in exchange for something else. For investors, it means that you can have growth, but not value — or value, but not growth. Luckily, the stock market doesn’t deal in absolutes.  I’ve found a company that offers both high growth potential along with a bargain valuation and a generous dividend. Yet where I’ve found this stock may be the biggest surprise of all. Shipping stocks haven’t been held in high regard for some time… Read More

As kids, we’re taught that “you can’t have your cake and eat it too.”  #-ad_banner-#There’s always a trade-off, always an opportunity cost to forgo in exchange for something else. For investors, it means that you can have growth, but not value — or value, but not growth. Luckily, the stock market doesn’t deal in absolutes.  I’ve found a company that offers both high growth potential along with a bargain valuation and a generous dividend. Yet where I’ve found this stock may be the biggest surprise of all. Shipping stocks haven’t been held in high regard for some time now. A look at the Baltic Dry Index (BDI) tells you everything you need to know about investor sentiment in the sector: ^BDIY data by YCharts This might cause concern among investors currently looking at these stocks, but it doesn’t reflect the general attitude that shippers and charters currently have. A strong rally is widely expected as Chinese demand for steel and coal continue to climb, and iron exports from Brazil and Australia are expected to rise as well.  Analysts predict an average range around 1,500… Read More

Back when chip giant Intel (Nasdaq: INTC) was new and no one had invented the Internet, computers were huge machines that could each take up an entire room. #-ad_banner-#Intel’s ideas seemed like an abstraction, but it eventually became the default standard in computing innovation, and went on to invent the x86 set of microprocessors that are now found in most computers. An investor would be hard-pressed to find a technology company that has done more than Intel to shape the world of semiconductors that are the building blocks of modern computing. But… Read More

Back when chip giant Intel (Nasdaq: INTC) was new and no one had invented the Internet, computers were huge machines that could each take up an entire room. #-ad_banner-#Intel’s ideas seemed like an abstraction, but it eventually became the default standard in computing innovation, and went on to invent the x86 set of microprocessors that are now found in most computers. An investor would be hard-pressed to find a technology company that has done more than Intel to shape the world of semiconductors that are the building blocks of modern computing. But today another company may represent the future of chips. The world of computing is on the brink of another sea change — the age of digitally connected devices, the so-called Internet of Things. Some optimists say the Internet of Things could be a new industrial revolution that will link up 50 billion devices together and generate up to $5 trillion in revenue in less than a decade. But the world of the Internet of Things is a lot more than tablets and smartphones talking to one another.  According to the invaluable tech resource WhatIs.com: “A thing,… Read More

Rock-bottom interest rates and huge cash stockpiles have led to a rebirth in the market for mergers and acquisitions (M&A) over the past few years. Faced with a weak economic recovery and a lack of organic growth opportunities, companies have used acquisitions to increase sales by gobbling up competitors and firms in related industries.  #-ad_banner-#As enterprise values creep up and this external growth strategy becomes expensive, we may be entering a new stage for the market. This next stage could be defined by internal reviews by companies looking for ways to improve the bottom line through cost-cutting and… Read More

Rock-bottom interest rates and huge cash stockpiles have led to a rebirth in the market for mergers and acquisitions (M&A) over the past few years. Faced with a weak economic recovery and a lack of organic growth opportunities, companies have used acquisitions to increase sales by gobbling up competitors and firms in related industries.  #-ad_banner-#As enterprise values creep up and this external growth strategy becomes expensive, we may be entering a new stage for the market. This next stage could be defined by internal reviews by companies looking for ways to improve the bottom line through cost-cutting and integration of acquisitions.  It’s these transformational companies that you should be watching for now. Potential transformational targets are companies that have seen sales jump after a series of acquisitions but that may still have operating margins and profitability that trail well behind their peers. These companies’ shares may perform well enough, but management is leaving money on the table due to poor efficiency.  Once leadership decides to make a change, that’s when the real opportunity starts. I’ve found just such a company. In a bid to change its industry focus, this manufacturer has acquired 21 other companies over the past… Read More

After digesting Twitter’s (NYSE: TWTR) impressive second-quarter results, investors may have a sense of deja vu.  Just a year earlier, Facebook (Nasdaq: FB) was staring down a wall of cynicism — and delivered scorching results. Shares delivered huge upside on that second-quarter report a year ago, and went on to deliver even more impressive gains over the following year. #-ad_banner-#Facebook’s problem back then was quite simple: It had a huge user base but wasn’t making much money off of those users. That’s no longer the case. Those same concerns dogged… Read More

After digesting Twitter’s (NYSE: TWTR) impressive second-quarter results, investors may have a sense of deja vu.  Just a year earlier, Facebook (Nasdaq: FB) was staring down a wall of cynicism — and delivered scorching results. Shares delivered huge upside on that second-quarter report a year ago, and went on to deliver even more impressive gains over the following year. #-ad_banner-#Facebook’s problem back then was quite simple: It had a huge user base but wasn’t making much money off of those users. That’s no longer the case. Those same concerns dogged Twitter, though as I noted last month, the drivers were in place to enable Twitter to deliver much stronger quarterly revenues than analysts had been anticipating. Frankly, Twitter only needed decent upside to see its shares move out of the doghouse. As I wrote in June: “Analysts expect Twitter’s second-quarter sales to rise more than 10% sequentially, which would be good enough to change the tone of conversation around this broken stock. A ‘glass half full’ perspective (instead of ‘half empty’) could push this stock right back to $40.” As it turns out, Twitter did a whole lot better than… Read More

For investors who check the daily finish of the S&P 500, it would appear as if the stock market is the picture of health. That index of large companies stands within 1% of its all-time high. But for the stocks of smaller companies, the seas have grown steadily rougher. The Russell 2000, a small-cap index, is off roughly 5% in the past month and has now seen several rapid pullbacks since the start of the year. This index has seen solid buying support at the 1,100 mark (it currently stands at 1,140) in prior dips, but if the recent pullback… Read More

For investors who check the daily finish of the S&P 500, it would appear as if the stock market is the picture of health. That index of large companies stands within 1% of its all-time high. But for the stocks of smaller companies, the seas have grown steadily rougher. The Russell 2000, a small-cap index, is off roughly 5% in the past month and has now seen several rapid pullbacks since the start of the year. This index has seen solid buying support at the 1,100 mark (it currently stands at 1,140) in prior dips, but if the recent pullback pushes the Russell below the 1,100 threshold, investors may conclude that the bull market for small caps is over and it’s time to focus elsewhere. #-ad_banner-#To be sure, small caps have been in rally mode ever since the bull market began in March 2009. Back then, the Russell 2000 stood below 400. Such stocks always rally coming out of recessions, but as I noted last year, they tend to lag the market in the latter stages of a bull market. We may now be witnessing a grand rotation out of small caps, and if so, you can read… Read More

As President Barack Obama took office in January 2009, investors were in despair. An economy in dire straits had already led to a free-falling market, and things only got worse in the early months of the year. #-ad_banner-#Then, quite suddenly, everything changed. The fear-based selling had exhausted itself. And on March 9, 2009, the S&P 500 would reverse course. The bull market that ensued has surprised even the most bullish investors. Few would have guessed that an economy that never truly recovered from the Great Recession of 2008 would be capable of fueling a 193% gain in the stock market… Read More

As President Barack Obama took office in January 2009, investors were in despair. An economy in dire straits had already led to a free-falling market, and things only got worse in the early months of the year. #-ad_banner-#Then, quite suddenly, everything changed. The fear-based selling had exhausted itself. And on March 9, 2009, the S&P 500 would reverse course. The bull market that ensued has surprised even the most bullish investors. Few would have guessed that an economy that never truly recovered from the Great Recession of 2008 would be capable of fueling a 193% gain in the stock market over the next five and a half years. Here’s a look at five surprising facts about this unusual bull market. 1. Nobody Wants To Lock In Profits In almost any bull market, you’ll see a stretch of gains, followed by a modest pullback, which is then followed by more gains. But in this market, there are no pauses. Though the S&P 500 repeatedly moved above and below its 150-day moving average (MA) in the early stages of the bull market, the market now appears to be on autopilot, inching steadily higher with nary a pullback. The fact that the S&P… Read More

A business professor once told me that a successful business is 1% idea and 99% execution.  #-ad_banner-#Sure, it helps to have an innovative or useful product, but you absolutely must be able to run the business efficiently and effectively. Lack of a valid business strategy is why nearly 80% of small businesses fail within the first 18 months.  Thinking about this recently, I was struck by a great investment idea: What if I could find a company that let others do the work — a company that benefited from other companies’ research or marketing spending? A company that… Read More

A business professor once told me that a successful business is 1% idea and 99% execution.  #-ad_banner-#Sure, it helps to have an innovative or useful product, but you absolutely must be able to run the business efficiently and effectively. Lack of a valid business strategy is why nearly 80% of small businesses fail within the first 18 months.  Thinking about this recently, I was struck by a great investment idea: What if I could find a company that let others do the work — a company that benefited from other companies’ research or marketing spending? A company that helped other companies in exchange for a slice of the pie… a middleman, in other words. Granted, no company is completely without execution risk, and there will always be operational challenges, but distributors and business service companies are the closest I’ve found to a risk-reduced middleman. These companies do not need to spend billions of dollars on research or product development — the manufacturers do it for them. They also do not need to spend billions on advertising to push products out to retail or enterprise consumers — the resellers do that job. Some of these companies do not even… Read More