5 Best Blue Chip Stocks To Watch For 2014

After yesterday's sluggish showing in which the Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJINDICES: ^DJI  ) lost 138 points on concerns over global manufacturing and slow hiring, blue chips rebounded Thursday, nearly erasing all of Wednesday's losses. Today's surge stemmed partially from a move that many economists already expected: the European Central Bank cut the benchmark refinancing rate from 0.75% to 0.5%, attempting to encourage borrowing to stimulate growth.�

What economists didn't see coming was a sudden drop in claims for jobless benefits, which reached the lowest level in more than five years. Stocks responded by firing on all cylinders, as 90% of Dow components climbed. And none rose more rapidly than Cisco Systems (NASDAQ: CSCO  ) , which added 1.8% after a serious stumble yesterday caused by concerns over rival Arista Networks' new super-fast data switch offering.�

While technically the third largest gainer of the day, Chevron's (NYSE: CVX  ) considerable weight in the index makes the oil giant's 1.5% gains worthy of discussion. Chevron shares enjoyed a boost today after an Ontario judge blocked legal efforts by a law firm to seize some of Chevron's foreign assets -- an attempt based on an $18 billion ruling against the company in Ecuador.�

5 Best Blue Chip Stocks To Watch For 2014: McDonald's Corporation(MCD)

McDonald?s Corporation, together with its subsidiaries, operates as a worldwide foodservice retailer. It franchises and operates McDonald?s restaurants that offer various food items, soft drinks, coffee, and other beverages. As of December 31, 2009, the company operated 32,478 restaurants in 117 countries, of which 26,216 were operated by franchisees; and 6,262 were operated by the company. McDonald?s Corporation was founded in 1948 and is based in Oak Brook, Illinois.

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By Sean Williams]

  The restaurant sector is extremely competitive to begin with, so any negative publicity can crush a company, regardless of its size or dominance, over the short term. This week has been something of a nightmare for fast-food restaurant chains McDonald's (NYSE: MCD  ) and Burger King Worldwide (NYSE: BKW  ) .

• [By Alex Planes]

  Mickey D's in the Middle Kingdom
  �The 1997 research paper Golden Arches East, edited by James L. Watson, offers this fascinating tidbit on McDonald's (NYSE: MCD  ) debut in Beijing:

5 Best Blue Chip Stocks To Watch For 2014: Apple Inc.(AAPL)

Apple Inc., together with subsidiaries, designs, manufactures, and markets personal computers, mobile communication and media devices, and portable digital music players, as well as sells related software, services, peripherals, networking solutions, and third-party digital content and applications worldwide. The company sells its products worldwide through its online stores, retail stores, direct sales force, third-party wholesalers, resellers, and value-added resellers. In addition, it sells third-party Mac, iPhone, iPad, and iPod compatible products, including application software, printers, storage devices, speakers, headphones, and other accessories and peripherals through its online and retail stores; and digital content and applications through the iTunes Store. The company sells its products to consumer, small and mid-sized business, education, enterprise, government, and creative markets. As of September 25, 2010, it had 317 retail stores, including 233 stores in the United States and 84 stores internationally. The company, formerly known as Apple Computer, Inc., was founded in 1976 and is headquartered in Cupertino, California.

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By Evan Niu, CFA]

  Over the decades, there has been a long history of Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT  ) copying Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL  ) . This trend most notably started with the graphical user interface, or GUI, that the Mac first brought to consumer PCs and was subsequently followed by Windows.

• [By Sue Chang and Saumya Vaishampayan]

  $AAPL: Apple (AAPL) �shares climbed 1.8%, among the top gainers in the S&P 500 (SPX) �. The stock was raised to a buy rating from hold on Monday by Jefferies, which also raised its price target to $600 from $425. The move came after Jefferies analysts met with Apple�� suppliers in Asia, who have become ��ar more lenient on price,��which will lift gross margins. Analyst Peter Misek also said Apple�� price is likely to appreciate ahead of the iPhone 6 launch.

• [By Diane Alter]

  Money Morning knows that savvy investors make money in all market scenarios. With that in mind, following is a recap of some of the best stocks to buy now that Money Morning featured last week.

  Best Stocks to Buy Now The political unrest in Syria has caused an oil-price spike. Fears are growing that a prolonged conflict could spread to neighboring oil-rich countries, disrupt supplies, and send oil prices soaring some $10 to $20 a barrel. Money Morning Global Energy Strategist Dr. Kent Moors details how investors can play oil's "Syrian Premium."
  September is historically the worst month for stocks, and this September could be especially rocky as we approach the U.S. Federal Reserve's crucial Sept. 17-18 FOMC meeting. Money Morning Global Investing and Income Strategist Robert Hsu says he expects stocks to remain range bound heading into the central bank gathering. But, he tells readers how to make money from this tight trading range with one simple trade that lasts 10 days and gives investors the perfect blend of low risk and high probability. The key to a successful business can be summed up simply as having high profit margins. While revenue growth for U.S. businesses has been strong so far in 2013, with steady growth expected going forward, profit margins have only showed slight improvement. In How Investors Can Unlock the Power of Profit Margins, we explain how readers can find companies with the best sustainable profit margins and share three fantastic finds. Investors on the prowl for the best stocks to buy now frequently hunt among those involved in the shale oil boom. North America is undergoing an energy revolution. One formation in the western United States was certified by the United States Geological Service (USGS) as having 3 trillion barrels of oil. New supplies of oil and gas are bein
• [By Rick Munarriz]

  There were a whopping 49.2 million tablets shipped during the first three months of this year, well ahead of the 20.3 million devices that shipped during the first quarter of 2012. However, Google's (NASDAQ: GOOG  ) Android and Apple's (NASDAQ: AAPL  ) iOS combined for more than 96% of the market.�

Hot Financial Stocks To Watch For 2014: Chevron Corporation(CVX)

Chevron Corporation, through its subsidiaries, engages in petroleum, chemicals, mining, power generation, and energy operations worldwide. It operates in two segments, Upstream and Downstream. The Upstream segment involves in the exploration, development, and production of crude oil and natural gas; processing, liquefaction, transportation, and regasification associated with liquefied natural gas; transportation of crude oil through pipelines; and transportation, storage, and marketing of natural gas, as well as holds interest in a gas-to-liquids project. The Downstream segment engages in the refining of crude oil into petroleum products; marketing of crude oil and refined products primarily under the Chevron, Texaco, and Caltex brand names; transportation of crude oil and refined products by pipeline, marine vessel, motor equipment, and rail car; and manufacture and marketing of commodity petrochemicals, plastics for industrial uses, and fuel and lubricant additives. It a lso produces and markets coal and molybdenum; and holds interests in 13 power assets with a total operating capacity of approximately 3,100 megawatts, as well as involves in cash management and debt financing activities, insurance operations, real estate activities, energy services, and alternative fuels and technology business. Chevron Corporation has a joint venture agreement with China National Petroleum Corporation. The company was formerly known as ChevronTexaco Corp. and changed its name to Chevron Corporation in May 2005. Chevron Corporation was founded in 1879 and is based in San Ramon, California.

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By Dan Caplinger]

  Some stocks didn't manage to recover from early losses, however. Chevron (NYSE: CVX  ) finished the day down 0.8%, extending its losses over the past few days. Given crude oil's price gain of nearly $1 per barrel today, most of Chevron's energy-company peers managed to post at least modest rebounds today, even though the sector has underperformed the broader market throughout the rally of the past six months. Investors might be concerned that the unfreezing of the company's assets in Argentina might lead Chevron to make greater investment in the country, potentially exposing it to future nationalizations of assets that could end up costing Chevron even more in lost assets. Avoiding political risk will be key for the company as it navigates various world energy markets.

5 Best Blue Chip Stocks To Watch For 2014: International Business Machines Corporation(IBM)

International Business Machines Corporation (IBM) provides information technology (IT) products and services worldwide. Its Global Technology Services segment provides IT infrastructure and business process services, including strategic outsourcing, process, integrated technology, and maintenance services, as well as technology-based support services. The company?s Global Business Services segment offers consulting and systems integration, and application management services. Its Software segment offers middleware and operating systems software, such as WebSphere software to integrate and manage business processes; information management software for database and enterprise content management, information integration, data warehousing, business analytics and intelligence, performance management, and predictive analytics; Tivoli software for identity management, data security, storage management, and datacenter automation; Lotus software for collaboration, messaging, and so cial networking; rational software to support software development for IT and embedded systems; business intelligence software, which provides querying and forecasting tools; SPSS predictive analytics software to predict outcomes and act on that insight; and operating systems software. Its Systems and Technology segment provides computing and storage solutions, including servers, disk and tape storage systems and software, point-of-sale retail systems, and microelectronics. The company?s Global Financing segment provides lease and loan financing to end users and internal clients; commercial financing to dealers and remarketers of IT products; and remanufacturing and remarketing services. It serves financial services, public, industrial, distribution, communications, and general business sectors. The company was formerly known as Computing-Tabulating-Recording Co. and changed its name to International Business Machines Corporation in 1924. IBM was founded in 1910 and is based in Armonk, New York.

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By Alex Planes]

  Tabulating a dynasty
  IBM (NYSE: IBM  ) was created on June 16, 1911, as the result of a merger between three technically inclined manufacturing businesses. It was known as the Computing-Tabulating-Recording Company until 1924 -- the same year that Ford built its 10 millionth Model T. CTR, as it was sometimes known, traced its origins to an inventor named Herman Hollerith, who devised a punched-card tabulator that offered tremendous time savings for enterprises (like the U.S. Census) engaged in the tedium of tallying up vast quantities of data. However, it wasn't Hollerith who built IBM into the business-services behemoth you know today. Much of IBM's character was formed during the tenure of the two Thomas Watsons, a legendary father-and-son executive pair that guided the company for more than half a century. You can read more about IBM's origins and its Watson-driven rise to prominence when you click on this link.

• [By Jim Jubak]

  This quarter, big economic bellwether stocks such as IBM (IBM) and Kellogg (K) have shown signs that the days of being able to use stock buybacks and cost cutting to generate growth in earnings per share, even when revenue isn't growing, may be numbered. Or, at least, that the market's enthusiasm might be waning.

• [By Rich Duprey]

  A 10-year, $600 million contract awarded by the Central Intelligence Agency could provide�Amazon.com (NASDAQ: AMZN  ) �stock with a big boost, pitting its web services division against more traditional providers like IBM (NYSE: IBM  ) and Hewlett-Packard (NYSE: HPQ  ) .

• [By Beth Piskora]

  They are listed below:

  Altera (ALTR)��ielding 1.7%
  
  Apple (AAPL)��ielding 2.5%
  
  Applied Materials (AMAT)��ielding 2.6%
  
  Cisco (CSCO)��ielding 2.9%
  
  EMC Corp. (EMC)��ielding 1.5%
  
  International Business Machines (IBM)��ielding 2.0%
  
  KLA-Tencor (KLAC)��ielding 3.2%
  
  Microchip Technology (MCHP)��ielding 3.6%
  
  Oracle (ORCL)��ielding 1.5%
  
  Qualcomm (QCOM)��ielding 2.1%
  
  Texas Instruments (TXN)��ielding 2.9%
  
  Xilinx (XLNX)��ielding 2.3%
  
  

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5 Best Blue Chip Stocks To Watch For 2014: Visa Inc.(V)

Visa Inc., a payments technology company, engages in the operation of retail electronic payments network worldwide. It facilitates commerce through the transfer of value and information among financial institutions, merchants, consumers, businesses, and government entities. The company owns and operates VisaNet, a global processing platform that provides transaction processing services. It also offers a range of payments platforms, which enable credit, charge, deferred debit, debit, and prepaid payments, as well as cash access for consumers, businesses, and government entities. The company provides its payment platforms under the Visa, Visa Electron, PLUS, and Interlink brand names. In addition, it offers value-added services, including risk management, issuer processing, loyalty, dispute management, value-added information, and CyberSource-branded services. The company is headquartered in San Francisco, California.

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By Mani]

  Visa Inc. (NYSE: V) is expected to report its fiscal fourth quarter and full-year 2013 financial results on�Wednesday, Oct. 30, 2013. Visa's executive management team will host a live audio webcast beginning at 5:00 p.m. Eastern Time (2:00 p.m.�Pacific Time) on the same day to discuss the results and business highlights.