Friday, October 24, 2014

Top 5 Defensive Stocks To Own Right Now

Estimates are that we get something like 5,000 marketing and sales messages a day, and with the holiday shopping season in full swing, that number probably has increased.

But many of the sales pitches we receive may not come from those trying to get us to buy a new toaster or vacation in an exotic locale. Some come from those we work with, whether a colleague or a vendor.

COLUMN: Art of influence is in how you ask
COLUMN: Get skills to market yourself to others

Do you pay attention when you feel a team member is trying to "sell" you something? Or do you tune that person out?

If you're not receptive to the message, you're not alone.

"People get defensive when they detect the pitch. They feel like something is being forced on them," says Steve Yastrow, author of the upcoming Ditch the Pitch: The Art of Improvised Persuasion

Hot Transportation Stocks For 2015: ServiceSource International Inc.(SREV)

ServiceSource International, Inc. manages the service contract renewals process of maintenance, support and subscription agreements for technology and technology-enabled healthcare, and life sciences companies. The company provides end-to-end management and optimization of the service contract renewals process, including data management, quoting, selling, and service revenue business intelligence. It offers an integrated solution that consists of Service Revenue Intelligence Platform, a data warehouse of transactional, analytical, and industry data that provides insight into the business; service sales teams working under its customers? brands; and Service Revenue Performance Suite, a suite of cloud applications. The company?s cloud applications include Analytics Cloud, which provides customers with dashboards to view and analyze service revenue performance; Service Sales Cloud that provides renewals analytics and pipeline management used by service sales teams; and Chan nel Sales Cloud, which offers channel partners and resellers with online access to their specific renewals opportunities and their performance. Its cloud applications also comprise eCommerce Cloud that provides self-service capabilities to end customers through a secure online portal; Installed Base Intelligence Cloud, which offers a single repository to analyze the data, to flag anomalies and missing data elements, and to identify cross-sell and up-sell opportunities; and Dynamic Quoting Cloud that provides an easy-to-use tool for sales representatives and channel partners to create and modify service renewal quotes. The company sells its solutions directly through sales representatives in North America, Latin America, Europe, the Middle East, Africa, the Asia Pacific, and Japan. ServiceSource International, Inc. was founded in 2002 and is headquartered in San Francisco, California with additional offices in Colorado, Tennessee, Ireland, the United Kingdom, Malaysia, and Si ngapore.

Advisors' Opinion:
  • [By Steve Symington]

    What:�Shares of Servicesource International Inc (NASDAQ: SREV  ) plunged nearly 33% Friday after the recurring-revenue-management company turned in disappointing first-quarter results.

Top 5 Defensive Stocks To Own Right Now: Bison Petroleum Corp (BISN)

Bison Petroleum Corp. (Bison), incorporated on February 9, 2010, is an independent American oil and gas company founded to provide the United States energy security by developing and producing oil and gas from the nation's energy heartlands. Bison's holdings are located in the Bighorn Basin, Wyoming.

On August 9, 2013, he Company entered into a Lease Purchase Agreement with Nelan Advisors Corporation (Nelan), whereby Nelan sold certain oil and gas leases issued by the State of Wyoming to Bison. Bison focuses to commence oil and gas drilling operations on these leases.

Advisors' Opinion:
  • [By Peter Graham]

    On Friday, small cap stocks Bison Petroleum Corp (OTCMKTS: BISN) and Interactive Leisure Systems Inc (OTCMKTS: IALS) sank 16.27% and 16%, respectively, and despite being the subject of recent paid promotions or investor relation campaigns. Of course, there is nothing wrong with a properly disclosed stock promotion or paid for investor relations campaigns, but investors and traders alike need to be careful about how they get into and exit such stocks before getting badly burned. With that in mind, here is a quick look at both small cap stocks to help you decide on an investment or trading strategy for this week:

    Bison Petroleum Corp (OTCMKTS: BISN) Has Given Another Corporate Update

    Small cap Bison Petroleum Corp is a publicly traded oil and gas exploration and development company based in Salt Lake City, Utah, and dedicated to the exploration and development of domestic Energy in the Bighorn Basin of Wyoming. On Friday, Bison Petroleum Corp sank 16.27% to $1.39 for a market cap of $65.35 million plus BISN is up 396.4% since last June according to Google Finance.

Top 5 Defensive Stocks To Own Right Now: Polaris Industries Inc. (PII)

Polaris Industries Inc. designs, engineers, and manufactures off-road vehicles. It offers all terrain vehicles and side-by-side vehicles for recreational and utility use; snowmobiles; and on-road vehicles, including motorcycles and low emission vehicles. The company also provides replacement parts and accessories, including winches, bumper/brushguards, plows, racks, mowers, tires, pull-behinds, cabs, cargo box accessories, tracks, and oil for off-road vehicles; covers, traction products, reverse kits, electric starters, tracks, bags, windshields, oil, and lubricants for snowmobiles; and saddle bags, handlebars, backrests, exhaust, windshields, seats, oil, and various chrome accessories for motorcycles. Polaris Industries sells its products through dealers and distributors primarily under the RANGER, RANGER RZR, RANGER Crew, Victory Vision, Victory Cross Roads, Polaris RUSH, and Cross Country trade marks. In addition, it markets helmets, jackets, bibs and pants, leathers, a nd hats through dealers and distributors, as well as online under the Polaris brand name. The company principally operates in the United States and Canada. Polaris Industries Inc. was founded in 1987 and is headquartered in Medina, Minnesota.

Advisors' Opinion:
  • [By Rich Smith]

    The Department of Defense awarded a total of 16 contracts Tuesday, worth a combined $2.7 billion. One award, however, stood out from the pack both for its sheer size and the unusual identity of the recipient: Polaris Industries (NYSE: PII  ) , a company better known for its snowmobiles and ATVs than for its military hardware.

  • [By Monica Gerson]

    Polaris Industries (NYSE: PII) is expected to report its Q3 earnings at $1.61 per share on revenue of $1.05 billion.

    Kimberly-Clark (NYSE: KMB) is estimated to report its Q3 earnings at $1.40 per share on revenue of $5.23 billion.

Top 5 Defensive Stocks To Own Right Now: Cadence Design Systems Inc (CDS)

Cadence Design Systems, Inc. (Cadence) develops electronic design automation (EDA), software, hardware, and silicon intellectual property (IP). Cadence licenses software and IP, sells or leases hardware technology and provides engineering and education services worldwide to help manage and accelerate electronics product development processes. The Company�� customers use its products and services to design and develop complex integrated circuits (ICs) and electronics systems. The Company combines its products and technologies into platforms for four design activities: Functional Verification; Digital IC Design and Implementation; Custom IC Design and Verification, and System Interconnect Design. It sells software using three license types: subscription, term and perpetual. It also offers a number of fee-based services, including engineering and education services. In June 2010, Cadence acquired Denali Software, Inc. (Denali). In May 2011, it acquired Altos Design Automation, Inc. On July 11, 2011, the Company acquired Azuro, Inc. In July 2012, the Company acquired Sigrity, Inc. In April 2013, Cadence Design Systems Inc announced the acquisition of Tensilica, Inc. In May 2013, the Company acquired Cosmic Circuits Pvt Ltd. In June 2013, Cadence Design Systems Inc announced that it has completed the acquisition of the IP business of Poland-based Evatronix, SA SKA. In February 2014, Cadence Design Systems Inc completed the acquisition of Forte Design Systems.

The four Cadence design platforms are branded as Incisive functional verification, Encounter digital IC design, Virtuoso custom design and Allegro system interconnect design. In addition, the Company augments these platform product offerings with a set of design for manufacturing (DFM), products that service both the digital and custom IC design flows. These solutions and their constituent elements are marketed to users who specialize in areas, such as system design and verification, functional verification, logic design, digital imple! mentation, custom IC design and printed circuit board (PCB), and IC package / SiP design.

Functional Verification

Cadence�� functional verification offerings consist of two categories: Logic Verification and System Design and Verification. Logic Verification offering consists of planning, property checking, testbench simulation, verification IP, and environment capabilities within the Incisive functional verification platform. This offering enables the Company�� customers to employ enterprise-level verification process automation, including metric-driven verification planning, process tracking and management. System Design and Verification offerings consist of hardware-assisted verification with emulation and acceleration, including the verification computing platform Palladium XP, Palladium and Xtreme platforms, system-level design capabilities, verification IP, estimation of system-on-chip (SoC), consulting services, and methodologies. The QuickCycles program allows customers access to its simulation acceleration and emulation products, either on their secure Internet site or remotely over a secure network connection. The products obtained through the acquisition of Denali include verification IP, memory models, and design IP.

Digital IC Design and Implementation

Cadence�� Digital IC offerings are used by its customers to create logical representations of a digital circuit or IC. The Company�� Digital IC offerings include two categories: Logic Design and Physical Implementation. Logic Design offering consists of formal verification, equivalency checking, synthesis and test capabilities within the Encounter digital IC design platform and property checking, simulation, and environment capabilities within the Incisive functional verification platform. This offering provides chip planning, design, verification and test technologies and services to customers across all digital design end markets. Physical Implementation offering consists of a ra! nge of th! e Encounter digital IC design platform capabilities. The Physical Implementation offering includes timing analysis, signal integrity, power analysis, extraction, physical verification, and place and route capabilities within the Encounter digital IC design platform. It enables the customers to create a physical representation of logic models, analyze electrical and physical characteristics of a design and prepare a design for manufacturing.

Custom IC Design and Verification

Cadence�� Custom IC Design and Verification offerings are used by its customers to create schematic representations of circuits down to the transistor level for analog, mixed-signal, custom digital, memory and radio frequency (RF) designs. These logical representations are verified using simulation tools optimized for each type of design. The offering includes the environment, IC layout and simulation capabilities within the Virtuoso custom design platform. Other tools in the Custom IC portfolio are used to prepare the designs for manufacturing.

System Interconnect Design

Cadence�� System Interconnect Design offerings are used by its customers to develop printed circuit board (PCBs), and IC packages. The offerings include the capabilities within the Allegro system interconnect design platform: PCB, IC package, SiP, design management and collaboration. The Company�� offerings also include the simulation capability within the Virtuoso custom design platform. These offerings enable engineers who are responsible for the capture, layout and analysis of advanced PCB and IC packages to design electronic products across the domains of IC, IC package and PCB. For PCB customers, the Company provides the OrCAD family of offerings that is marketed worldwide through a network of resellers.

The Company competes with Synopsys, Inc., Mentor Graphics Corporation and Magma Design Automation, Inc.

Advisors' Opinion:
  • [By Jim Jubak]

    The price of Credit-Default Swaps (CDS) used to insure US government debt against the possibility of default climbed to 35.5 basis points Wednesday. That was the highest level in six months, and up from 32 basis points on Friday, September 27. But that level is still well below the 62 basis points it cost to insure US government debt against default at the time of last debt ceiling battle, in the summer of 2011. That was the highest level since the global financial crisis. (What this means is that an investor would pay 62,000 euros a year to insure 10 million euros of US Treasuries against a default in the next five years. The contract is denominated in euros to offset the impact of a default on the US dollar.) This insurance is getting more popular too, with these CDS contracts ranking as the fifteenth most traded of the contracts tracked by the Depository Trust & Clearing Corp. in the week through Sept. 27. That's up from a rank of 147th for the previous week.

  • [By cody56]

    The top contributors to performance during the period were Trimble Navigation (TRMB), Sensata Technologies�(ST) and Cadence Design Systems (CDS).

    Trimble Navigation provides location-based solutions to its customers that enhance their productivity and profitability. The recovery in construction end markets and continued strong demand from the farm economy resulted in strong overall financial results for the company and a strong stock price. We trimmed the position as it began to exceed the upper end of the market cap range that we invest in. Sensata Technologies develops, manufactures and sells sensors and controls. We are attracted to the company�� large growth opportunity, which is driven by increased sensor penetration in industries such as automobiles and general industrial opportunities. We find Sensata�� business model to be attractive given the stability of its revenues, strong operating leverage and excellent management team. During the period, the company benefited from a rebound in European automobile sales and deployed capital in several small accretive acquisitions. We have been trimming the position modestly as the stock approaches our price target.

    Meridian Growth Fund performance

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