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AnnaLisa Kraft

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  • Panning for Solid Gold Pantry Stocks

    By AnnaLisa Kraft - May 21, 2013 | Tickers: BGS, CALM, PF

    Using a stock screener is a lot like panning for gold. After screening over 4,000 food and beverage stocks on criteria of a minimum four star CAPS rating, yield over 2.5%, and Wall Street outperforms, three names come up shining: Cal-Maine Foods (NASDAQ: CALM), B&G Foods (NYSE: BGS) and Pinnacle Foods (NYSE: PF). I was fully expecting to see names like General Mills or McCormick.

    Defensives have more »

  • Should You Profit from the Millennials' Malaise?

    By AnnaLisa Kraft - May 20, 2013 | Tickers: AN, CAR, KMX, F, GM

    Maybe it all started going south for the Millennials when  the ramp up in college costs drove their generation to take on debt. Maybe it was a perfect storm of a recession, tight job market, and tighter credit, not to mention a financial crisis in which universities' endowments lost money big time, but the end result is the same. A generation that can't afford to buy new cars or more »

  • Partnering Up for Profits

    By AnnaLisa Kraft - May 20, 2013 | Tickers: AMZN, EBAY, GOOG

    Online retailer and digital payments giant eBay (NASDAQ: EBAY) is partnering up with the trendy Kate Spade Saturday label, owned by Fifth Pacific, on a bricks and mortar pop-up shop in Manhattan to debut very soon. This flirtation with retail rather than e-tail is a significant change of attitude for eBay.

    This pop-up shop will feature a life-size touchscreen as the display window allowing shoppers to buy when the physical more »

  • The Big Bang Island Theory

    By AnnaLisa Kraft - May 18, 2013 | Tickers: GE, GOOG, IBM

    Big Bang Theory meet Gilligan's Island meet Survivor (or maybe Thunderdome?).  After last week's I/O keynote Google (Nasdaq:GOOG) CEO Larry Page profferred his idea for an island where scientists could study and experiment unconstrained by government regulation or corporate greed.

    The maddest of the mad scientists would get to live on Larry Page's Island. How cool is that? I would pay good money to see more »

  • APPlauding Apple for 50 Billion Reasons

    By AnnaLisa Kraft - May 16, 2013 | Tickers: AAPL, BBRY, GOOG

    Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL) achieved 50 billion apps downloaded on May 15. Should anyone care... aside from the fact that there's only around 7 billion people on the planet?

    The good news

    Apple investors should be jazzed by this news as Research in Motion (NASDAQ: BBRY) and Google (NASDAQ: GOOG) Android might not hit this milestone for some time, or ever in the case of Research in Motion. According to more »

  • Battleground Stocks Winning Their Wars

    By AnnaLisa Kraft - May 16, 2013 | Tickers: FSLR, GMCR, TSLA

    High short interest and negative commentary haven't deterred the share price of three battleground stocks from flying. Green Mountain Coffee Roasters (NASDAQ: GMCR), Tesla Motors (NASDAQ: TSLA), and First Solar (NASDAQ: FSLR) have shrugged off the shackles of negativity and shorts. Can they continue to beat the Street?

    Momentum names

    First Solar soared 231.25% over the last year, yet there is a 33% short interest. Green Mountain climbed more »

  • The Cider House Rules for Brewers

    By AnnaLisa Kraft - May 16, 2013 | Tickers: BUD, SAM, TAP

    There are some places where you can't get a bad meal or a bad drink, Paris, Frisco, New Orleans. When I went to Paris I discovered cidre, apple cider with a kick. It went down all too easy with savory crepes and my friend and I were pleasantly surprised at how much we liked it (a little too much). Now Americans are discovering cidre.

    Cidre or hard cider (basically more »

  • What This Fool Learned:On Buffett, Burgers, and Bull Markets

    By AnnaLisa Kraft - May 16, 2013 | Tickers: BRK-B, BWLD, BKE

    One year ago I wrote my first Motley Fool post, "Call Me, Shia!" on how actor Shia LeBoeuf nailed it on a call to go long McDonald's. Since then I've learned anything with Warren Buffett or burgers in the title is boffo (a word I love to use if you've been following along).

    First and foremost

    After having written the equivalent of three full-length Great American Novels more »

  • Three Housing Plays to Hold Forever

    By AnnaLisa Kraft - May 15, 2013 | Tickers: HHC, BX, TOL

    As I wrote before, I'm not entirely sold on a housing boom, what with college debt levels increasing and impoverishing what should be a new generation of homebuyers.

    However, three companies hold properties that they've either bought at fire sale prices or are upscale enough they wouldn't attract first time homebuyers. Those companies are Blackstone (NYSE: BX), Howard Hughes Corporation (NYSE: HHC) and Toll Brothers (NYSE: TOLmore »)

  • Selling the Sizzle and Sell the Fizzle

    By AnnaLisa Kraft - May 15, 2013 | Tickers: RDEN, PG, REV, EL

    According to a French scientific abstract,  women use make-up for two completely different reasons, camouflage or seduction. Whatever the reason, beauty is a multi-billion dollar business globally and investors should get in on the action. Markup on cosmetics and fragrances can range from 15% to several hundred percent.

    There is barely an inch of a woman's exterior body that some potion can't "improve," from the size of pores more »

  • Three Terrific Tips from Titan Tilson

    By AnnaLisa Kraft - May 14, 2013 | Tickers: BRK-B, HTZ, NFLX

    At last week's Value Investing Congress, brainchild of Kase Capital's investing titan Whitney Tilson, the keynote presentation by Tilson highlighted three stocks he still loves: Netflix (NASDAQ: NFLX), Berkshire Hathaway (NYSE: BRK-B), and Hertz Global Holdings (NYSE: HTZ).

    These three are close to 52 week highs and the Street seems to love them, too. And why not, when each has been heading steadily higher?  However, none of these more »

  • Fifty Shades of Green

    By AnnaLisa Kraft - May 13, 2013 | Tickers: SAM, CHD, LVS, MGM

    Drinking, gambling, and sex are preoccupations that can make green (money) for your portfolio and can still satisfy investors who expect a sustainably green (pro-environment) performance.

    An "evergreen" business model

    Church & Dwight (NYSE: CHD), the maker of Arm & Hammer baking soda cleaning and personal care products, makes the naughty (in a nice way) list.

    There are few cleaner and greener companies in the cleaning space since baking soda is widely more »

  • 3 Financials for a First-Rate Portfolio

    By AnnaLisa Kraft - May 13, 2013 | Tickers: FNF, FAF, FCNCA

    The Value Investing Congress headed by Whitney Tilson just wrapped up in Vegas. While not as ballyhooed as the Ira Sohn and the Salt conferences, value investors eagerly anticipate its new long and short ideas. This time around there were three financials highlighted as long ideas.

    First Citizens Bancshares (NASDAQ: FCNCA) was presented by Chris Mayer. Title insurers First American Financial (NYSE: FAF) and Fidelity National Financial (NYSE: FNF) were more »

  • Target Hits and Misses the Bullseye

    By AnnaLisa Kraft - May 11, 2013 | Tickers: COST, TGT, WMT

    Let me get this straight, to get the Target (NYSE: TGT) digital deals through Cartwheel by Target, its new initiative with Facebook in beta, these are the hoops I have to jump through:

    1. Sign in to the Target Cartwheel site

    2. Log on to Facebook

    3. Scroll through hundreds of deals (700 now-may expand to 1,000)

    4. Print out or scan the coupon codes on a smart phone more »

  • Has Abercrombie Finally Lost its Cool?

    By AnnaLisa Kraft - May 10, 2013 | Tickers: ANF, LTD, BKE, URBN

    What Abercrombie & Fitch (NYSE: ANF) has been doing to promote their brand as exclusive is, to put it mildly, not cool. In their pursuit to attract the Queen Bees and Homecoming Kings, the elite of teen consumers, their strategy is to dissuade fully half (and possibly more) of their addressable market from buying their product.

    So not cool

    CEO Michael Jeffries has been the mastermind behind the publicly stated corporate more »

  • Love and the Pursuit of Happiness: Themes for Your Portfolio

    By AnnaLisa Kraft - May 9, 2013 | Tickers: REV, RST, LOV, WTW

    Several recurring themes came out from the Value Investing Congress just ended in Las Vegas but the most interesting was that of meeting higher order needs, like love and self-improvement, with four names recommended as longs, Rosetta Stone (NYSE: RST), Revlon (NYSE: REV), Spark Networks (NYSEMKT: LOV), and Weight Watchers (NYSE: WTW) and one name, quelle surprise, recommended as a short, who else but Herbalife.

    If the economy is indeed more »

  • Three Stocks to Rock Your World

    By AnnaLisa Kraft - May 9, 2013 | Tickers: MELI, MDLZ, PM

    Three stocks, two of which are spinoffs from American giants and another that is rocking with Latin Americans, can jump start a portfolio's performance with their superior growth and yield.

    Philip Morris International (NYSE: PM), Mondelez (NASDAQ: MDLZ), and Mercadolibre (NASDAQ: MELI) have been en fuego of late.  All three reported within the last week.

    Ay, caramba!

    Mercadolibre, the Latin American version of eBay, reported strong sales growth and more »

  • 3 Pepper-Uppers for Your Portfolio

    By AnnaLisa Kraft - May 8, 2013 | Tickers: CVGW, FIZZ, SENEA

    Whose portfolio couldn't use a little Vitameatavegamin? Not everything has soared in this run to Dow 15,000. Maybe you need a little diversification and are looking for some promising small caps.

    You probably remember the classic I Love Lucy skit where Lucy gets drunk while filming a commercial for the alcohol-laced tonic. But seriously, using the Motley Fool.com stock screener (look under the CAPS tab) I discovered more »

  • Turn a Lemon (Liz Lemon) of a Portfolio Into Lemonade

    By AnnaLisa Kraft - May 7, 2013 | Tickers: AAPL, DEO, KRFT, PFE, DIS

    How I miss the NBC show, "30 Rock". Suave exec Jack Donaghy asks head writer Liz Lemon if she watches CNBC. "No, CNBC gives me a headache. I get all my money advice from PBS." Cut to Liz on sofa watching a cartoon fox asking, "Where should I put my money? Tech stocks or the housing market?" Liz jumps up and down screaming,"Tech stocks, Foxy Moneybags!! Tech stocks!!"

    All more »

  • Sniffing Out the Best Stocks

    By AnnaLisa Kraft - May 7, 2013 | Tickers: GVDNY.PK, IPAR, IFF

    Sometimes, the entire city smelled like strawberry or popcorn. In summer, the scent hung heavy in the humid air mixing pleasantly with yeasty aromas from the many small breweries. Cincinnati could also smell rank from soap rendering, but the fragrance from the Tastemaker flavorings factory masked it and made the city a memorable olfactory delight.

    The future of fragrance and flavorings

    Flavorings and fragrances are a multi-billion dollar business worldwide more »

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