Stock Of The Week For Defensive Investor (May 12, 2009)

Here is the stock of the week that is good enough for defensive investors (This stock has met criteria to be a good stock for defensive investor according to Benjamin Graham's tenet):

Company's Name: AstraZeneca plc (Stock Ticker: AZN)

Stock Price: US$38.15 (May 11, 2009)

Market Capitalization: 56.85 billion

Price/Earnings: 8.44

Price/Book Ratio: 3.59

Total Cash: 4.49 billion

Profit Margin: 21.33%

This company's key ratios was better than average companies, where the Price/Book Value Ratio was small. And if you compare it with its direct competitor (GSK, MRK and NVS), the company's PE was the smallest. It means that the company's stock price was cheap enough..

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Posted in: Stock Of The Week For Defensive Investors

Wall Street Opened Higher Again (May 4, 2009)

Wall Street soared again at the opening after the news that pending home sales gained 3.2 percent in March. This news was better-than-expected and have increased the investors' mood.

The National Association of Realtors said that the homebuyers pushed the seasonally adjusted index of pending sales up by 3.2 percent to 84.6 in March. This may be a sign that the economy began to stabilize again.

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Wall Street Slipped At The Opening But Finally Rose Again (May 1, 2009)

U.S. stock market slipped at the opening due to many negative economic datas and profit taking action made by investors. But at the time this article was written, the stock market has increased again becaused of consumer sentiment's increase.

MasterCard Inc said that their first quarter earnings fell 18 percent to $367 million ($2.80 per share), whereas previosly they earned $447 million ($3.37 per share) last year. The results beat Wall Street expectations, but MasterCard said that their revenue would be lower than expected this year.

Hartford Investment Group reported its first quarter loss of around $1.21 billion($3.77 per share). The result was worse-than-expectation ($3.05 per share).

Chevron said that its first quarter earnings fell to $1.84 billion (92 cents per share), whereas previously it earned $5.17 billion ($2.48 per share) last year.

But the stock market rebounded after The Reuters/University of Michigan Surveys of Consumers said its final index of confidence climbed to 65.1 in April from 57.3 in March.

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Posted in: News