The American dream still thrives in the stock investing market. It is the only investment vehicle that has proven to increase wealth over time and one that mitigates inflationary pressures. The question for the average stock investing person is how to find the offbeat stock that flies beneath the popularity grid yet still maintains the potential for a positive Return On Investment (ROI). The following indicates some not so glamorous stocks that have strong growth and high employee satisfaction. The employee satisfaction is an integral component of a successful operation because the satisfied employee goes the extra distance for the company, lessens the impact on employee benefit packages and thereby, enhances the Earnings Per Share (EPS). The following companies score in the Forbes, 100 Best Companies to Work For in 2008, while exhibiting positive growth. Read more »

Financial companies have borne the brunt of the downturn in the U.S. stock investing market in the last year. For some companies, such as Bear Stearns and Countrywide Financial, the bottom has dropped out all the way to requiring takeovers by competitors in order to avoid bankruptcy. For other companies, such as Lehman Brothers (LEH) or mega-insurer American International Group (AIG), the impact has cut share prices in half, or worse. Read more »

The real estate market like all other asset classes is subject to the laws of supply and demand. When supply outstrips demand, inventory rises, prices fall and it takes longer for sellers to sell their homes. The longer it takes for a seller to offload his or her property the more likely they are to drop prices. Real estate unlike many other investments usually involves a significant cash outlay to purchase and sell; as a result there is a sizable carrying cost for holding real estate as an investment. Forget the flippers and the no document, no down payment sales, they are not investments in the traditional sense of an investment, they fall more into the class of so called investments called ponzi schemes. Read more »

Worried about your investments if your candidate doesn’t win in November? Whether the Internet savvy Obama, or the defense minded McCain prevails, you can protect yourself and even make money with covered call investing.

Look over your portfolio segments. If a democrat wins and you own oil stocks, write covered calls on them with a strike price at or a little lower than the current market price. Since democrats are no friends of big oil, their constant negativity may drive prices down. Read more »

How does 3.9% average return in one week grab you?

An investor investing in ten S&P500 high potential return covered calls on May 9, 2008 would have experienced a 3.9% return in just one week and would have outperformed the S&P500 by 1.1% (S&P500 return was 2.8%). Read more »

MasterCard (MA) reported a huge boost in profits and revenue during its first quarter earnings announcement. The company seemingly scoffed at the notion of a credit crunch. Net income for the quarter ended March 31 was $446.9, or $3.38 per share. The incredible earnings report was a big driver of stock trading shortly following the announcement.

During the same quarter last year, MasterCard earned $214.9 million, or $1.57 per share. Revenue grew an incredible 29.2 percent for the quarter showing a strong increase in business demand for the company’s credit products. Revenue for the 2008 first quarter was $1.18 billion. Last year’s first quarter saw revenue of $915.1 million. Read more »

Exxon Mobil (XOM) announced a first quarter profit growth of 17 percent in spite of the fact the company said it was not aided by higher gas prices. The world’s second largest publicly traded oil company earned $10.9 billion during its first quarter. This is the second largest quarterly profit ever reported by a US company, which obviously attracts attention from the stock trading markets. The all-time high was Exxon’s $11.7 billion earnings from the fourth quarter of 2007.

Exxon and other major oil companies have been targeted by government officials and consumer watch groups who say it is not fair for oil companies to experience record profits while consumers are seeing record prices at the pump. Exxon said it has not really benefited from high consumer prices because the company itself relies on purchasing highly priced crude oil from other markets. Read more »

Blue chip technology leader IBM (IBM) excited the US stock trading markets with an exciting first quarter earnings report. First quarter profits jumped a remarkable 26% for the Armonk, New York based company. It also blew away analyst estimates for the quarter, which is always a motivator for trading portfolio additions.

For it fiscal first quarter, IBM reported earnings of $2.32 billion, which amounts to $1.65 per share. During its first quarter in 2007, the company netted a profit of $1.84 billion, or $1.21 per share. This was a significant boost for the bell weather in the midst of a generally floundering US economy. IBM has long been a staple of many long-term stock trading strategies based on its consistency and income performance. Read more »

The Monsanto Company (MON),a multinational agricultural biotechnology corporation, delivered great news to the stock investing community with incredible second quarter growth this year: $3.8 billon. This amazing 45 percent growth in revenues over last year’s effort was driven by domestic and international growth. The Monsanto Company is the world’s leading producer of the herbicide glyphosate, marketed as Roundup. Sales of this herbicide and others were $982 million globally compared to $530 last year. Dramatic increases in revenues ($1,747 million from $1,192 million in 2007) mainly from the US and Brazilian corn seed and traits business also contributed to this record growth. The year-to-date sales were 42 percent higher than sales compared with the same period in fiscal year 2007. Read more »

FactSet Research Systems, Incorporated (FDS), a leading provider of financial data and information analysis software, based out of Norwalk, Connecticut, announced an 11% profit jump for its fiscal second quarter, over its prior year second quarter. The company credited the strong rise in profit to a sharp increase in subscriptions for its investment management business.

Profit rose from $26.5 million in its 2007 fiscal second quarter to $29.5 million for the 2008 quarter. This amounted to a jump from 52 cents per share to 59 cents per share, inspiring news for the stock investing community. When excluding one-time items, the company actually produced $31.1 million in earnings, or 62 cents per share. Sales were strong for the company, climbing 20.6%, from $116.3 million to $140.2 million. Read more »