This week, five Machinery stocks are improving their overall ratings on Portfolio Grader. Each of these stocks is rated an “A” (“strong buy”) or “B” overall (“buy”).
This week, Westinghouse Air Brake Technologies Corporation (NYSE:) is making solid headway. The company’s rating improves to an A (“strong buy”) from last week’s B (“buy”) rating. Westinghouse Air Brake Technologies is a provider of value-added, technology-based products and services for the global rail industry. In Portfolio Grader’s specific subcategory of Equity, WAB also gets an A. .
Top Japanese Companies To Own In Right Now: NuStar GP Holdings LLC (NSH)
NuStar GP Holdings, LLC (NuStar GP Holdings), incorporated on June 06, 2000, conducts operations through its indirect ownership interests in NuStar Energy L.P. (NuStar Energy). NuStar Energy is engaged in the terminalling and storage of petroleum products, the transportation of petroleum products and anhydrous ammonia, and petroleum refining and marketing. The Company operates in three segments: NuStar Energy�� Storage Segment, NuStar Energy�� Pipeline Segment and NuStar Energy�� Asphalt and Fuels Marketing Segment. On January 1, 2013, NuStar Energy sold the San Antonio Refinery and related assets, which included inventory, a terminal in Elmendorf, Texas and a pipeline connecting the terminal and refinery. On December 13, 2012, NuStar Energy completed its acquisition of the TexStar Crude Oil Assets (as defined below), including 100% of the partnership interest in TexStar Crude Oil Pipeline, LP, from TexStar Midstream Services, LP and certain of its affiliates.
NuStar Energy has terminal and storage facilities in the United States, Canada, Mexico, the Netherlands, including St. Eustatius in the Caribbean, the United Kingdom and Turkey. NuStar Energy L.P.'s asphalt refineries, refined product terminals, petroleum and specialty liquids storage and terminaling operations, and crude oil storage tank facilities are predominantly located on waterways that are easily accessible by barge or vessel. On September 28, 2012, NuStar Energy sold a 50% ownership interest (the Asphalt Sale) in NuStar Asphalt LLC (Asphalt JV), previously a wholly owned subsidiary of NuStar Energy, to an affiliate of Lindsay Goldberg LLC (Lindsay Goldberg), a private investment firm.
Advisors' Opinion:- [By Robert Rapier]
NuStar Energy does have a publicly traded general partner in�NuStar GP Holdings�(NYSE: NSH) which went public in 2006. The GP pays a lower dividend at 5.8 percent, but has significantly outperformed the limited partner since it went public:
Hot Services Companies To Buy Right Now: Corinthian Colleges Inc (COCO)
Corinthian Colleges, Inc., incorporated on July 24, 1996, is a post-secondary education company in the United States and Canada. As of June 30, 2013, the Company had a student enrollment of 81,284 and operated 97 schools in 25 states, and 14 schools in the province of Ontario, Canada. It offers a variety of diploma programs and associate, bachelor's and master's degrees. The Company�� training program areas include healthcare, criminal justice, business, mechanical, trades, and information technology. The Company�� diploma curricula includes medical assisting, medical insurance billing and coding, massage therapy, dental assisting, pharmacy technician, medical administrative assisting, surgical technology, automotive and diesel technology, heating, ventilation, and air conditioning (HVAC), plumbing, electrical, and licensed practical nursing. Its core degree curriculum includes business administration, accounting, paralegal, criminal justice, medical assisting, and registered nursing.
Diploma programs are generally designed to have duration of approximately 8-12 months, depending on the course of study. Associate degree programs are generally designed to have duration of approximately 24-28 months, bachelor's degree programs are generally designed to have duration of approximately 48 months and master's degree programs are generally designed to have duration of approximately 21 months. As of June 30, 2013, approximately 39% of its students were enrolled in diploma programs, approximately 55% of students were enrolled in associate programs, approximately 5% of students were in bachelor's programs and approximately 1% of students were in master's programs.
The Company�� career services departments assist students in preparing resumes, help them to develop a professional demeanor and other soft skills that are important in the workplace, conduct practice interview sessions, and identify prospective employers for graduates. At the Company�� Everest locations in Florida, ! Phoenix, AZ, Mesa, AZ, Springfield, MO and Ontario Metro, CA, some of its associate degree programs also articulate into a bachelor's degree in the same course of study. Master's degrees are also offered at Everest Florida in business administration and criminal justice. As of June 30, 2013, 94 out of 111 schools were operating under the Everest brand, five schools were operating under the WyoTech brand, and 12 schools were operating under the Heald brand.
Advisors' Opinion:- [By Bryan Murphy]
While the given problems that are plaguing Corinthian Colleges Inc. (NASDAQ:COCO) are unique to that particular for-profit school today, the underpinnings for today's 62% implosion from COCO shares are just as big of a threat to the likes of Apollo Education Group Inc. (NASDAQ:APOL), Career Education Corp. (NASDAQ:CECO), and most other for-profit education names. In fact, those woes have been well documented for a while, and showing up each company's books for almost as long. Pictures tell the grim tale for CECO, APOL, and all the rest as effectively as any words could, so let's let the images of what's going on here do most of the talking, beginning with... Career Education Corp.
- [By Dan Caplinger]
On the other hand, students do seem to be making some moves that indicate greater fiscal responsibility for their own financial lives. Just last week, for-profit educational institution Apollo Group (NASDAQ: APOL ) reported sharply lower enrollment, including a 25% drop in new students. ITT Educational (NYSE: ESI ) saw more modest declines when it reported in April, but new student enrollment was still down 3.6%. A new investigation last month from the SEC over Corinthian Colleges (NASDAQ: COCO ) marked just the latest in a string of regulatory crackdowns on for-profit educational institutions. More generally, increased government scrutiny as well as reports of higher student-loan default rates among many players in the for-profit industry compared to nonprofit educational institutions have led would-be students to question the value proposition for-profit educational companies offer.
- [By Ben Levisohn]
Allegion plc (ALLE) will replace J. C. Penney Company Inc. in the S&P 500, J. C. Penney will replace A茅ropostale Inc. (ARO) in the S&P MidCap 400, and A茅ropostale will replace Corinthian Colleges Inc. (COCO) in the S&P SmallCap 600 after the close of trading on Friday, November 29.
Hot Services Companies To Buy Right Now: Fomento Economico Mexicano SAB de CV (FOMC)
Fomento Economico Mexicano SAB de CV (FEMSA) is a Mexico-based holding company engaged in the beverages industry. Through its subsidiary Coca-Cola FEMSA SAB de CV, the Company is active in the production and distribution of a variety of non-alcoholic beverages, bottled water and still beverages such brands as Coca-Cola, Fanta, Sprite, Powerade, Delaware Punch and other trademark beverages of The Coca-Cola Company in Mexico. Through FEMSA Comercio SA de CV, it operates the OXXO convenience-store chain in Latin America. The Company operates in a number of Latinamerican countries and in Philippines. Advisors' Opinion:- [By Canadian Value]
Also interesting is that the duration of rising rate environments is distinctly shorter after 1982. The average duration declines to 14 months from 40 months prior to 1982. A possible explanation could be changes in the monetary mechanism influencing interest rates. In 1982, the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) first referenced a targeted federal funds rate.7
- [By CanadianValue]
Former Philadelphia Fed President Edward Boehne elegantly described the approach at a Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) meeting in late 1989:
��ow, sooner or later, we will have a recession. I don�� think anybody around the table wants a recession or is seeking one, but sooner or later we will have one. If in that recession we took advantage of the anti-inflation (impetus) and we got inflation down from 4 1/2 percent to 3 percent, and then in the next expansion we were able to keep inflation from accelerating, sooner or later there will be another recession out there. And so, if we could bring inflation down from cycle to cycle just as we let it build up from cycle to cycle, that would be considerable progress over what we��e done in other periods in history.��/p>
Hot Services Companies To Buy Right Now: Palo Alto Networks Inc (PANW)
Palo Alto Networks, Inc., incorporated in March 2005, offers a network security platform that allows enterprises, service providers, and government entities to secure their networks. The core of its platform is the Company�� firewall that delivers natively integrated application, user, and content visibility and control through its operating system, hardware, and software architecture. The Company primarily sells its products and services to end-customers through distributors, resellers, and partners, and directly to end-customers (collectively partners), who are supported by its sales and marketing organization, in the Americas, in Europe, the Middle East, and Africa (EMEA), and in Asia Pacific and Japan (APAC). Its products and services can address a range of its end-customers��network security requirements, from the data center to the network perimeter, as well as the distributed enterprise, which includes branch offices and a number of mobile devices. It introduced PA-5000 Series and GlobalProtect subscription service in March 2011 and the PA-200 and WildFire subscription service in November 2011.
The Company�� platform is delivered in an appliance form factor and includes a suite of subscription services, as well as support and maintenance. Its subscription services can be activated on any of its appliances. All of the Company�� appliances incorporate its PAN-OS operating system and are based on its identification technologies, App-ID, User-ID, and Content-ID, which allow security policies to be defined within the context of applications, users, and content. It delivers these capabilities through a single-pass parallel processing architecture that simultaneously performs multiple identification, security and networking functions. The Company serves the enterprise network security market, which consists of Firewall/ Virtual Private Network (VPN), Unified Threat Management (UTM), Web Gateway, Intrusion Detection and Prevention (IDP/IPS), and VPN technologies. The Company deriv! ed 62% of its total revenue from the Americas, 27% from Europe, the Middle East, and Africa (EMEA), and 11% from Asia Pacific and Japan (APAC) as of January 31, 2012.
The Company derives revenue from sales of its products and services, which together comprise its platform. Product revenue is primarily generated from sales of its Firewall. The Company�� Threat Prevention, universal resource locator (URL) Filtering, and GlobalProtect subscriptions provide its end-customers with real-time access to the antivirus, intrusion prevention, Web filtering, and malware protection capabilities across fixed and mobile devices. The Company�� application classification engine, called App-ID, uses multiple identification techniques to determine the exact identity of applications traversing the network. App-ID is the foundational classification engine that provides the core traffic classification to all other functions in its platform. The App-ID classification is used to invoke other security functions.
App-ID uses a series of classification techniques to identify an application. App-ID classifies all network traffic, including business applications, consumer applications, and network protocols, across all ports. User-ID integrates its platform with a range of enterprise user directories and technologies, including Active Directory, eDirectory, Open LDAP, Citrix Terminal Server, Microsoft Exchange, Microsoft Terminal Server, and ZENworks. Content-ID is a collection of technologies that enables its subscription services. Content-ID combines a real-time threat prevention engine, cloud-based analysis service, and a URL categorization database to limit unauthorized data and file transfers, detect and block a range of threats, and control non-work related Web surfing. Its WildFire, cloud-based analysis service provides a real-time analysis engine for detecting previously unseen malware. Its URL filtering database consists of millions of URLs across many categories and is designed to monitor a! nd contro! l employee Web surfing activities. Single-Pass Parallel Processing Architecture (SP3) has two elements: single-pass software and parallel processing hardware.
The PAN-OS Operating System operating system provides the foundation for its network security platform and contains App-ID, User-ID, and Content-ID. PAN-OS performs the core functions of its platform, while also providing the networking, security, and management functions needed for implementation. The PAN-OS networking functions include dynamic routing, switching, high availability, and VPN support, which enables deployment into a range of networking environments. PAN-OS also includes attack protection capabilities, such as blocking invalid or malformed packets, IP defragmentation, TCP reassembly, and network traffic normalization. The Company also offers, such as application traffic management, solution design and planning, configuration, and firewall migration. Its education services provide classroom-style training and are primarily delivered through its partners.
The Company competes with Cisco, Juniper, Intel, IBM, HP, Check Point Software, Fortinet and Sourcefire.
Advisors' Opinion:- [By The Value Investor]
Shareholders of Palo Alto Networks (PANW) have seen solid returns into, and immediately after, the release of the company's fourth-quarter earnings report.
No comments:
Post a Comment