A recent article in The Economist caught my eye, and a particular statistic I found interesting was that until 1800, China and India accounted for about half of the global economy. The Industrial Revolution in the late 1700s shifted the balance of power to… Read More

All eyes will be on Ben Bernanke this Wednesday as the Federal Reserve finally spells out the details of its much-anticipated second round of Quantitative Easing, known as “QE2.” [For more on QE2 and how it works, read this InvestingAnswers.com article] The Fed‘s efforts to stimulate the economy through bond buybacks have led investors to already open the champagne. As I noted recently, the S&P 500 has already appreciated by more than $1 trillion simply in anticipation of any presumed benefits. But in recent days, economists… Read More

All eyes will be on Ben Bernanke this Wednesday as the Federal Reserve finally spells out the details of its much-anticipated second round of Quantitative Easing, known as “QE2.” [For more on QE2 and how it works, read this InvestingAnswers.com article] The Fed‘s efforts to stimulate the economy through bond buybacks have led investors to already open the champagne. As I noted recently, the S&P 500 has already appreciated by more than $1 trillion simply in anticipation of any presumed benefits. But in recent days, economists are beginning to doubt whether Mr. Bernanke is going to bring out the large cannons, or simply a set of pea-shooters. More specifically, will QE2 be large enough to get the economy going, buying back up to $1 trillion in bonds, or will the Fed believe that a few hundred billion dollars will be sufficient? #-ad_banner-#A pair of fresh economic data points point to the latter. Last week, we saw a moderate drop in weekly jobless claims that makes it clear that unemployment is at least not getting worse at this point. And then on Monday… Read More

An historic Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) meeting is being held this week. The results of that meeting could have a significant impact on what the market does for the month of November and beyond. We get the results of… Read More

Investors hear a lot of talk about index funds and diversifying risk. And on its face, diversification seems like a reasonable strategy for long-term investing. I disagree. As a matter of… Read More

It’s pretty simple really. You sell products, you bring in revenue. Subtract whatever cash was spent on those products (cost of goods sold) and you have gross profit. The larger the gross profit, the more earnings are left over once… 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. 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