Saturday, June 26, 2010

"Sometimes you can read the tea leaves in one stock sector and gleen some good information about another stock sector"

Dow Jones 10,144 (Down) Week ending 06/25/2010

My friend Dave Thomas at work is always leaning over my cube to talk about the Phillies and to ask me why the stock of QUAKER CHEMICAL CORP. (Symbol KWR, $29.03) keeps going up and did I buy it yet? We started looking at the stock back when it was trading at $12-$14 and I kept telling Dave, who lives in Conshohocken where Quaker is based, that I could not figure out why the stock was rising this dramatically. (The KWR Total Return for 12 Months is 125.4%!).

So I listened to advice instead of giving advice this time and decided to check it out. Quaker Chemical is a global provider of process chemicals, chemical specialties, services, and technical expertise to a range of industries-including steel, automotive, mining, aerospace, tube and pipe, coatings and construction materials. I discovered that their chemical coolants have high demand in the Steel and Aluminum processing and grinding environment and that KWR had won a contract for a major automotive powertrain manufacturer. They had vastly improved their processes with their expertise in this area, certainly a value-add to the customer. Only 2 analysts cover this stock and both have a buy recommendation, so I would say you can go ahead and buy it here. So why all the demand you ask? The tea leaves lead me to the Steel industry sector and what appears to be explosive earnings coming in 2011.

The first thing I like about Precision Castparts Corp. (Symbol PCP, $ 108.56) is that "The Chairman" Mario Gabelli's GAMCO funds own a chunk of it, which is pretty reassuring. The company is projecting 2011 earnings per share of $7.43 and $8.58 per share in 2012. The company has a 5 year sales growth rate of 16.57%. It looks really good here.

The research on Quaker also lead me to United States Steel Corp. (Symbol X, $ 43.24). Between the improving automobile industry, (the average age of a car right now is 9 years, so people are due for a replacement), and the demand for steel in China and India, this looks interesting The earnings per share for 2010 is $1.87 and then ramps up dramatically in 2011 to $5.76 per share. The long term growth rate for earnings per share is 30%. Another buy.

Then if you are looking for a lower priced stock that you can buy a few more shares of, Steel Dynamics Inc. (Symbol STLD, 14.08) might be the ticket for you. They just had a soft quarter and the stock has come down since March so you get a bargain purchase. Earnings should recover nicely in 2011 to $1.95 per share.

So searching in chemicals led me to the Steel sector. I will keep a look out
for other cross currents across sectors that may bring up more bargains.

Sincerest regards and Go Phillies,

Freewilly

Saturday, June 19, 2010

Ferris Bueller; "Life moves pretty fast. If you don't stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it. "

Dow Jones 10450.64 (UP) Week ending 06-18-2010

Ferris Bueller. Sometimes it's fun to view the world through his eyes. His famous quotes like; " I do have a test today, that wasn't bullsh**. It's on European Socialism. I mean, really, what's the point? I'm not European. I don't plan on being European. So, who gives a crap if they're Socialists? They could be fascist anarchists, it still wouldn't change the fact that I don't own a car.". But it's his "Life moves pretty fast and needing to take a look around once in a while. (or you will miss it)" quote that I want to talk about today.

I was driving to work Tuesday morning and was about 5th in line at the stop light at Fitzwater and York Rd's,(in front of Giuseppe's restaurant). Sometimes on Tuesday mornings on the way to work I have car crashes. That has happened twice, but this was not one of those mornings.

I stopped to take a look around and saw a long freight train was coming by on the tracks that run by the PA. Turnpike. The first engine was a Norfolk Southern (Symbol NSC, $59.10) followed by a Burlington Northern Santa Fe engine which is owned by Warren Buffett and Berkshire Hathaway Inc. (Symbol BRK.B, $79.90) which all seemed pretty normal. But then I starting seeing car after car of double trailers of freight being hauled down the line. Most of the flat cars or spine cars that were going by had the truck trailers of J.B. Hunt Transport Services Inc. (Symbol JBHT, $35.01) on them. Yellow sign after yellow sign on the trucks went by. (It must have been a long red light!) Ben Stein pictured, a financial wizard himself, still calling; "Bueller? Bueller? Bueller?"

It got me to thinking that if we are in economic recovery mode that some of these transport stocks are certainly going to need to be part of it. So I took a look at JB Hunt Transport services(JBHT) which does look good here and also Oshkosh Corp. (symbol OSK, $35.26) which has a PE of 4 and also Paccar Inc. (symbol PCAR, $43.65) which has been really beaten up here but looks to be projecting a huge earnings rebound in 2011.

This Proustian-like experience also propelled me to discover in the transports the stock of Navistar International Corp. (Symbol NAV, $56.89) , another company projecting large earnings growth in 2011 from $3.07 to $5.09 per share.



So if you pay attention to Ferris when he says; "A person should not believe in an "-ism," he should believe in himself. I quote John Lennon; "I don't believe in Beatles, I just believe in me." , then you will probably believe in yourself and make some good Transport picks like these in the stock market.

Freewilly

Saturday, June 12, 2010

"Corning continues to roll out it's trademarked Gorilla Glass product for the mobile device market and its uses are only limited by your imagination"

Dow Jones 10211.07 (Strong UP) week ending 06/11/2010

Gorilla Glass. You gotta like that name. What is Gorilla glass? Corning® Gorilla® glass is an environmentally friendly alkali-aluminosilicate thin sheet glass
that is better able to survive the real-world events that most commonly cause glass failure. Its superior composition allows a deeper layer of chemical strengthening than is possible with most other chemically strengthened glasses — making it both strong and damage resistant. Currently, Gorilla glass is available as-drawn in thicknesses ranging from 0.5 mm – 2.0 mm. It is perfect for all portable devices that are subject to having the glass broken and is excellent for all touch screen devices.

Corning Inc. (Symbol GLW, $18.14)
which was already trading at a discounted forward PE of 8.6 since dropping off in the latest market sell off after a nice run from November 2009 to April 2010 seems to be a great bargain here. 13 analysts love the stock and it appears that 2010 earnings estimates were adjusted up but not the 2011 earnings estimate. So oddly it shows earnings going down next year?? You need to stay ahead of the numbers.

To read about Gorilla Glass you can go to Corning's website at: http://www.corning.com/gorillaglass/why_gorilla_glass.aspx

So if you have Gorillas or Elephants around your house that are always standing on, driving over, throwing because they are mad at relatives or boyfriends, dropping phones on a porcelain tile floor, scratching or otherwise defacing your portable mobile devices then you will probably need Gorilla Glass to solve your problems.

Add some Corning Inc.(GLW) to your portfolio and make it indestructible and scratch resistant! You need that in these markets!

King Kong survives! ..... Freewilly

Saturday, June 5, 2010

DNA, RNA, Retrovirus, Epigenetics, HERV-W, Immune System infections, what does any of this have to do with the Stock Market ?

Dow Jones 9,932 (Strong Down) Week Ending 06-04-2010


The reason I went to college and became a Psychology major in 1972 was because I wanted to learn more about the bio-chemical determinants of the mental illness Schizophrenia. A close friend of my brother was schizophrenic. The research that has gone on between then and now has moved light years forward. Human genome research holds the key to solving the riddle of a large swath of medical conditions,
Schizophrenia, MS, HIV, Cancer, Diabetes, Lupus, bipolar disorder, Alzheimer's disease and the retrovirus's that awaken them like herpes, toxoplasma, cytomegalovirus and Epstein- Barr virus and HERV-W. Environmental Stress also has the capability of changing epigenetic code within one generation. Just incredible research, mind boggling research.

Two must read articles for you. DISCOVER Magazine, June 2010 issue "The insanity virus". Second, Time Magazine, January 18, 2010 issue , "Why Genes Aren't Destiny".

Here are a couple ideas where all this work will not only pay off in alleviating allot of human suffering but could also make you some strategic investment returns. The stocks I will mention first are more speculative.


Human Genome Sciences Inc. (Symbol HGSI, $24.62) has 3 products in late stage development to treat Lupus, chronic hepatitis C, and type 2 diabetes mellitus. 13 Analysts have buy recommendations on it. Second is KERYX Biopharmaceuticals (Symbol KERX, $4.80) based out of New York City.

Third is Dendreon Corporation (Symbol DNDN, $40.84) with their just approved Prostate cancer drug PROVENGE. They are poised for rapid growth. DNDN has a 12 month return of 63.4% even though they do not have any sales and earnings yet. The 3 stocks I just mentioned can all be very volatile.

On the more conservative investment side you can buy Cephalon Inc. (Symbol CEPH, $59.11) with plenty of strong earnings.

Celgene Corp. (Symbol CELG, $51.55), and Gilead Sciences Inc. (Symbol GILD, $34.70) would also be solid portfolio additions with rapid growing business's.

Hopefully they will break the code and figure out the cure for all debilitating
illnesses.

Freewilly