It was at Roth capital’s annual growth stock conference that I happened to sit beside Mr. Harry Cochran at a presentation and started to learn the story of SinoHub (AMEX:SIHI).
Supply Chain Management
Investing, Long Term Investment, stock market | admin March 28, 2010 | 
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Paul Price submits:
Famous Dave’s of America {DAVE:$7.30} and its subsidiaries engage in the development, ownership, operation, and franchising of restaurants under the Famous Dave’s name. The company operates full-service and counter-service restaurants. As of January 3, 2010, it owned 177 restaurants operated in 37 states, including 45 company-owned restaurants and 132 franchise-operated restaurants. Dave’s specializes in hickory-smoked, off the grill items such as St. Louis-style ribs, Texas beef brisket and Georgia pulled pork with all the trimmings. The company was founded in 1994 and is based in Minnetonka, Minnesota.
Restaurants have been a ‘hot’ industry group as fears of the next Great Depression have been fading and life in the USA has been getting closer to the old normal. Casual dining stocks have been excellent performers since the March 9, 2009 low point.
There’s nothing like a potential act of war to press the ‘pause’ button on a bear market in bonds. The sinking of a South Korean warship in disputed waters (well, disputed by North Korea) initially raised concerns that the sinking was at the hands of Kim Jong-Il’s minions; while no one is really sure yet if that is true, or whether such an action would be part of an intentional provocation or a spastic exercise of diplomacy by other means (my bet is on spastic), the point is – as it always is when the Supreme Leader is concerned – that no one is really sure of what’s likely to happen next. It seemed prudent to cover short positions in bonds in such a context, but as the weekend has passed without further incident this has probably faded as a bullish influence.
Some bond bears were probably also scared by the fact that CNBC asked the question on Friday, “Time To Sell Bonds To Buy Stocks?” (Remind me when they last asked whether it was time to sell stocks to buy…anything?) They’re half right this time, I think, but I don’t like having them as company either. Balancing the Groucho effect (“I don’t want to belong to any club that would accept people like me as a member”) is the Holiday Inn Express effect (in which people develop amazing abilities unrelated to their backgrounds: “Are you a doctor?” “No, but I stayed at a Holiday Inn Express last night”). Barron’s, specifically Michael Santoli, who writes the “Streetwise” column, sought to explain why rising yields are good for stocks. When equity guys are busy telling the bond vigilantes why they’re not scared of them…they’re scared of them.
ETF Daily News submits:
Bill Shope Reports from Barrons:
As we approach the end of Apple’s (AAPL) March quarter, we believe it is now clear the company is running well ahead of our previous expectations and consensus, and we are raising estimates as a result. While upside is often the norm for Apple, we are still surprised by the current strength, as we believe Apple is now running well ahead of expectations in all of its key business segments during what is typically a seasonally “sloppy” quarter.
Outsourcing Insider submits:
By Audrey B.
With the passage of the historic, although much maligned, Obama healthcare reform bill in the US, a new opportunity has opened up for outsourcing companies as hospitals and insurance providers will now be seeking ways of minimizing expenses.
Faheem Gill submits:
I recently wrote about where we are in the energy cycle compared to historical norms. One of the comments led me to look at drillers in a bit more detail. As can be seen from the chart below of the P/B cycle, the drillers still can get back to their average P/B ~4. The chart looks similar to ’96 to me.
Click to enlarge:
Zack Buckley submits:
After researching over 5000 companies, I have come up with 50 stocks that I believe to be the most undervalued companies in the world. While I do not know where they will be going in the next year, as I cannot predict the market in the next six months, I believe in the next 5 years investors will be very rewarded by purchasing these companies.
The purpose of this series is not to go into great depth in the greatest opportunities in the world, but to cover enough to prove that listening to me in the future is worth your time. I will guarantee we’ve done much more research than my cursory summaries show. I am so emphatic about the prospects for these companies that I am going to China this summer for 3 months to visit these companies. I have created a tier system for the companies. While I think they are all great buys, the articles are tiered beginning with my favorite companies in the first article and progressively less attractive but still very undervalued companies in later articles.
R.J Steffens submits:
When one person makes an accusation, check to be sure he himself is not the guilty one. Sometimes it is those whose case is weak who make the most clamour.
~ Piers Anthony
Zack Buckley submits:
There has been much debate recently as to the future of the Chinese economy. Famous hedge fund manager Jim Chanos has publicly come out saying he will short the Chinese economy.
While I believe the Chinese real estate market and domestic stock market are overvalued, I think the Chinese companies trading on the U.S. exchanges are screaming buys. Buffett talked about feeling like “an oversexed man in a brothel” in the mid 1970s because he was so excited about the cheap prices in U.S. stocks; I feel the same about stocks in China right now. No one can predict market fluctuations; I just buy when stocks are trading at a huge discount to their intrinsic value.
Dividend Inc. submits:
Of particular note on the list, with an upcoming ex-dividend date, is AT&T (T) with a dividend yield of 6.30% and 13.67% from the 52-week low. It pains me to say it but the one quarterly dividend payment from AT&T beats most savings and money market accounts.
| Name | Symbol | Pct from Yr Low | Ex-Dividend Date | |
| Comcast Corporation | CMCSA | 41.26% | 4/4/2010 | |
| Monsanto Company | MON | 7.44% | 4/6/2010 | |
| AT&T Inc. | T | 13.67% | 4/6/2010 | |
| WGL Holdings Inc | WGL | 20.60% | 4/6/2010 | |
| Progress Energy Inc | PGN | 17.64% | 4/7/2010 | |
| Lakeland Financial | LKFN | 16.15% | 4/21/2010 | |
| Nor’west Natural | NWN | 17.94% | 4/27/2010 | |
| Paychex, Inc. | PAYX | 32.08% | 4/28/2010 |
Please verify the ex-dividend date and payout ratio before committing funds to these stocks. Additionally, do not base your next long or short-term purchase on the dividend payment or yield. Instead, get as much research in as you possibly can before the ex-dividend date "just in case" you’re actually interested in buying the stock. Companies are ranked by ex-dividend dates.
Ravi Nagarajan submits:
Middleburg Financial Corporation (MBRG) is a small bank holding company with primary operations in the western suburbs of Washington D.C. The bank’s headquarters are in Middleburg, Virginia. Over the past two years, David Sokol has accumulated nearly twenty percent of the bank’s outstanding shares in his personal accounts. Mr. Sokol is Chairman of MidAmerican Energy Holdings (MDPWK.PK) and Chairman and CEO of NetJets, both of which are subsidiaries of Berkshire Hathaway (BRK.A). Since Mr. Sokol is often mentioned as a potential future CEO of Berkshire Hathaway and would be responsible for allocation of capital, we found it interesting to learn of his significant personal investment in Middleburg Financial and decided to take a closer look.
Middleburg: The Heart of Virginia Hunt Country
Tom Konrad (AltEnergyStocks) submits:
This is the third year in a row I’ve published a list of ten stocks for the year ahead at the end of December. In 2008 my list trailed the broader stock market but beat the clean energy index, and last year it outperformed both. So far, this year looks more like 2008 than 2009. In addition to the portfolio of ten stocks, I gave an alternative portfolio which substituted two specialized exchange traded funds for six of the stocks. You can read the original article here.
For the first quarter, the portfolio was up 1.3%, including dividends, and the alternative portfolio with 4 stocks and two exchange traded funds [ETFs] was down 1.2% with dividends. These two results were bracketed by the broad Russell 3000 index (up 4.03%) and my sector benchmark, the Powershares Wilderhill Clean Energy ETF (PBW), which was down 11.57%.
Zacks.com submits:
Synnex Corp. (SNX) posted fiscal 2010 first-quarter results after the closing bell yesterday. The company reported net income of $34.7 million, compared to $18.9 million in the year-ago quarter. Earnings from continuing operations came in at 66 cents, which topped the Zacks Consensus Estimate by 4 cents, or nearly 6.4%.
Synnex is a business process services company, serving resellers and original 
equipment manufacturers (OEMs) worldwide. The company operates in two segments, distribution services and global business services (GBS). The flagship distribution services segment provides computer systems and complementary products to resellers, system integrators and offers assembly services to OEMs. The GBS segment offers services, such as customer management, software development, web hosting, domain name registration, and back office processing.
