Wednesday, October 29, 2014

Best Small Cap Companies For 2014

Small cap stocks Attitude Drinks Inc (OTCMKTS: ATTD), Axiologix, Inc (OTCMKTS: AXLX) and Unisource Corporation (OTCMKTS: USRC) have all been getting some attention lately in investment emails or investor alerts thanks in part to paid promotions. And while there is nothing wrong with properly disclosed paid promotions or investor relations activity, such activity can backfire on unwary investors or traders. With that in mind, here is a closer look at all three small cap stocks to help you decide whether they are truly hot or not:

Attitude Drinks Inc (OTCMKTS: ATTD) Says It Has Steady Growth and Consumer Appeal

Small cap Attitude Drinks is a beverage brand development company with a pure milk recovery drink, exploiting recent scientific evidence, confirming the benefits of milk and protein as an exercise recovery aid. On Friday, Attitude Drinks rose 6.45% to $0.0033 for a market cap of $104,834 plus ATTD is up 230% over the past year and down 98.7% over the past five years according to Google Finance.

Top 5 Gas Utility Stocks For 2015: Rackspace Hosting Inc(RAX)

Rackspace Hosting, Inc. operates in the hosting and cloud computing industry. It provides information technology (IT) as a service, managing Web-based IT systems for small and medium-sized businesses, as well as large enterprises worldwide. The company?s service suite includes dedicated hosting comprising customer management portal and other management tools that manage data center, network, hardware devices, and operating system software; and cloud computing that enables customers to provide and manage a pool of computing resources, as well as delivery of computing resources to business when they need them. It offers cloud servers, cloud files, and cloud sites, as well as cloud applications, such as email, collaboration, and file back-ups; and hybrid hosting that provides a combination of dedicated hosting and cloud computing services. The company also offers customer support services. It sells its service suite through direct sales teams, third-party channel partners, an d online ordering. The company was formerly known as Rackspace.com, Inc. and changed its name to Rackspace Hosting, Inc. in June 2008. Rackspace Hosting, Inc. was founded in 1998 and is headquartered in San Antonio, Texas.

Advisors' Opinion:
  • [By Rick Aristotle Munarriz]

    Alamy You can never know in advance all the news that will move the market in a given week, but some things you can see coming. From the release of a new video game console to an earnings report out of the world's largest retailer, here are some of the items that will help shape the week that lies ahead on Wall Street. Monday -- Host in the Machine: Most Internet users take web-hosting for granted, but leading websites and apps wouldn't be available if it wasn't for the growing fleet of servers manned by companies specializing in getting websites up and running. Rackspace (RAX) is a market darling among web hosts, and on Monday it will serve up its latest financials. This has become a competitive market as providers aim to host websites and cloud computing solutions. The end result is that analysts see Rackspace growing its revenue by a hearty 15 percent, but they also see profitability declining during the quarter. Tuesday -- KFC in China: Yum! Brands (YUM) is the parent company behind the fast food team of Pizza Hut, Taco Bell, and KFC. A surprisingly large portion of Yum! Brands' business in recent years has come from expanding its chicken chain in China. But the market has been challenging lately. Same-store sales for Chinese KFC locations plunged 14 percent in its latest quarter. As a result of its poor performance in the world's most populous nation, Yum! Brands is temporarily offering monthly same-store sales updates. It will offer an update on how October went on Tuesday after the market close. Wednesday -- Panic at the Cisco: It may seem like a long time ago, but there was a brief moment in time -- just before the dot-com bubble popped -- that Cisco (CSCO) commanded the largest market capitalization in the country. The Internet was all the rage with investors, and Cisco was the leading provider of routers, switches, and other networking gear that kept the whole web connected. The past few years have been volatile for Cisco, with the tech bellwet

Best Small Cap Companies For 2014: Sify Technologies Limited(SIFY)

Sify Technologies Limited provides enterprise and consumer Internet services primarily in India. The company offers various corporate network/data services comprising e-commerce and network connectivity solutions, such as end-to-end services network, application, and security services; voice origination and termination services; co-location and managed hosting services; and system integration services for data centre build, hardware distribution, security solutions, and turnkey projects. It also provides application services, including SLEMS and Microsoft Exchange messaging platforms; I-test for online assessment and LiveWire, which enable management of training processes across the organization; document management system for the management of documents electronically; and Forum, a forward supply chain solution. In addition, the company operates e-Ports that offer browsing, chat, email, gaming, utility bill payment, travel ticketing, hotel booking, mobile recharge, Intern et telephony, and online share trading services; and portals, which provide news, views, reviews, interactions, and services in the areas of movies, sports, finance, food, videos, astrology, online games, shopping, and travel, as well as offers content offerings and broadband services. Further, it provides infrastructure management services, such as network management, datacenter and helpdesk outsourcing, desktop and storage outsourcing, IT security outsourcing, LAN and WAN outsourcing, database and telecom outsourcing, and application monitoring and management services to automotive, chemical, media, and financial enterprises; and virtualization design, integration, and deployment services for servers, storage, networks, and end user clients. Sify has approximately 1,278 e-Ports in 200 towns and cities; and serves 1,06,000 broadband subscribers through 1500 cable TV Operators. The company, formerly known as Sify Limited, was founded in 1995 and is based in Chennai, India. Advisors' Opinion:

  • [By Jake L'Ecuyer]

    Leading and Lagging Sectors
    Technology stocks gained Tuesday, with Ku6 Media Co (NASDAQ: KUTV) leading advancers. Among leading tech stocks, gains came from Rubicon Technology (NASDAQ: RBCN), Bitauto Holdings (NYSE: BITA) and Sify Technologies (NASDAQ: SIFY).

  • [By Jake L'Ecuyer]

    Leading and Lagging Sectors
    Technology stocks gained Tuesday, with Ku6 Media Co (NASDAQ: KUTV) leading advancers. Among leading tech stocks, gains came from Rubicon Technology (NASDAQ: RBCN), Bitauto Holdings (NYSE: BITA) and Sify Technologies (NASDAQ: SIFY). Utilities shares dropped by 0.11 percent in the US market today.

Best Small Cap Companies For 2014: Achillion Pharmaceuticals Inc.(ACHN)

Achillion Pharmaceuticals, Inc., a biopharmaceutical company, engages in the discovery, development, and commercialization of treatments for infectious diseases. The company focuses on the development of antivirals for the treatment of chronic hepatitis C; and the development of antibacterials for the treatment of resistant bacterial infections. Its drug candidates for the treatment of chronic HCV include ACH-1625, a protease inhibitor, which is in phase IIa clinical trial for the treatment of chronic HCV; ACH-2684, a pangenotypic protease inhibitor, which is in phase I clinical trial for the treatment of chronic HCV infection; and NS5A inhibitors for the treatment of chronic HCV infection, including ACH-2928, which is to enter a phase I clinical trial, as well as various additional NS5A inhibitors in preclinical development. Its pipeline of product candidates also includes ACH-702 and ACH-2881 for drug resistant bacterial infections; elvucitabine for HIV infection; and AC H-1095 for HCV infection. The company was founded in 1998 and is based in New Haven, Connecticut.

Advisors' Opinion:
  • [By Ben Levisohn]

    After big rallies by biotech stocks, the folks at Weeden wondered if the rally getting overdone.�UBS analyst Matthew Roden and team think biotech stocks like Gilead Sciences�(GILD), Celgene�(CELG),�Vertex Pharmaceuticals (VRTX),�Puma Biotechnology (PBYI) and Achillion Pharmaceuticals (ACHN) can keep running. They explain why:

  • [By Sean Williams]

    In terms of clinical updates, hepatitis-C-focused biotech Achillion Pharmaceuticals (NASDAQ: ACHN  ) announced updated midstage results for its lead compound, ACH-3102, on Tuesday. In trials of genotype-1b treatment naive patients, ACH-3102 plus a ribavirin delivered a 75% success rate in end-of-treatment virologic response. The problem with these results is that not only is Achillion far behind its all-oral peers in terms of development, but its 75% success rate trailed that of Gilead Sciences' Sofosbuvir, which delivered 100% success rates in some of its late-stage trials featuring genotype-1 patients.

Best Small Cap Companies For 2014: Petroquest Energy Inc(PQ)

PetroQuest Energy, Inc. operates as an independent oil and gas company. It engages in the acquisition, exploration, development, and operation of oil and gas properties in Oklahoma, Arkansas, and Texas, as well as onshore and in the shallow waters offshore the Gulf Coast Basin. As of December 31, 2009, the company had estimated proved reserves of 1,931 thousand barrels of oil and 167,361 million cubic feet equivalent of natural gas. It owned working interests in 9 net producing oil wells and 277 net producing gas wells. PetroQuest Energy was founded in 1983 and is headquartered in Lafayette, Louisiana.

Advisors' Opinion:
  • [By Nitish]

    PetroQuest Energy, Inc. (PQ) last month announced results for the second quarter of 2014. The following compares certain second quarter 2014 metrics to those of the second quarter of 2013, highlighting the company's continued growth driven by its successful drilling programs in Oklahoma and Texas, its acquisition of certain Gulf of Mexico assets in July 2013 ("Gulf of Mexico Acquisition") and stronger natural gas prices:

  • [By Jon C. Ogg]

    PetroQuest Energy Inc. (NYSE: PQ) was downgraded to Neutral from Overweight at J.P. Morgan.

    Rubicon Technology Inc. (NASDAQ: RBCN) was downgraded to Underperform from Perform at Oppenheimer.

Best Small Cap Companies For 2014: Panera Bread Company(PNRA)

Panera Bread Company, together with its subsidiaries, owns, operates, and franchises retail bakery-cafes in the United States and Canada. Its bakery-cafes offer fresh baked goods, sandwiches, soups, salads, custom roasted coffees, and other complementary products, as well as provide catering services. The company also manufactures and supplies dough and other products to company-owned and franchise-operated bakery-cafes. As of March 29, 2011, it owned and franchised 1,467 bakery-cafes under the Panera Bread, Saint Louis Bread Co., and Paradise Bakery & Cafe names. The company was founded in 1981 and is based in St. Louis, Missouri.

Advisors' Opinion:
  • [By Demitrios Kalogeropoulos]

    But, with sales growth slowing, management hasn't felt confident enough to pull the trigger on price hikes and risk making the problem worse. Other fast-casual restaurants haven't had the same issue. Panera Bread� (NASDAQ: PNRA  ) , for example, benefited from a 2.3% rise in prices last quarter that helped fuel a 3.3% jump in comps. And, despite a similar reputation for using high-quality ingredients, the baker's food costs are much lower than Chipotle's, at a steady 29% of sales. Assuming sales growth firms up, there's no reason why Chipotle can't follow Panera's path and pass along some of its rising costs to customers.

  • [By AlphaStreetResearch]

    Buffalo Wild Wings (BWLD) has been a hot growth stock, but this company has plenty of room to run higher as the firm continues to execute its domestic and international growth strategy. This is a company with huge potential in Restaurant and Services sector as the company's customer base continues to grow and remain loyal. Below is our introduction into its business model, it's strengths, and the buying opportunity that currently exists for Buffalo Wild Wings. Wall Street has not yet realized the full potential of this company as it continues to be seen as a seasonality play in this space. The company continues to prove this stigma wrong. The company has a market cap of $2.06 Billion and reports the next quarter on October 21, 2013. With this in mind, we value Buffalo Wild Wings at $123.00 by year-end of 2013 and $138.00 by May 1, 2014, an increase of 28% from current levels. We strongly feel that this company has the potential to see major upside over the next year and we could see the stock continue to run like Chipotle (CMG) or Panera (PNRA) in recent history. Dining and entertainment demand is growing and Buffalo Wild Wings continues to take market share, as the company has some of the best customer retention rates and average ticket sales in the sector. We will later highlight:

  • [By WALLSTCHEATSHEET]

    Now that Panera has become a mainstream American brand with millions of loyal customers that enjoy one of the most casual and comfortable atmospheres available,��it�� a long-term OUTPERFORM. However, a tentative consumer, a somewhat poor valuation, and an artificially-inflated stock market are reasons�for caution.

  • [By Steve Symington]

    Meanwhile, same-store sales increased 1.4% at Buffalo Wild Wings' company-owned restaurants and 2.2% at franchised locations. While that still fell short of fast-casual competitor Panera Bread (NASDAQ: PNRA  ) , which posted company-owned same-store sales growth of 3.3%, CEO Sally Smith reminded investors that her company still outpaced the negative same-store sales trend prominent in the casual-dining category as a whole. What's more, remember that in February, B-Wild management had said same-store sales for the first six weeks of Q1 were�down 2.8%, so ending Q1 in positive territory reflected a huge improvement for the chain.

Best Small Cap Companies For 2014: EZchip Semiconductor Limited(EZCH)

EZchip, a fabless semiconductor company, engages in the development and marketing of Ethernet network processors for networking equipment. Its products include network processor chips, evaluation boards and network-processor based systems, and development software toolkits. The company offers network processors for use in forming the silicon core of networking equipment, such as switches and routers; and for voice, video and data integration in various applications. Its network processors are single-chip solutions, which enable its customers to design multi-port line cards, such as processing and classification engines, traffic managers, media access controllers, as well as a range of specialized hardware blocks that accelerate various functions. The company offers Evaluation systems which enable customers to test NPU-based systems; and toolkits that assist customers in creating, verifying, and implementing solutions based on its network processors. It provides a library f eaturing data plane code for a range of applications, which include Metro Ethernet protocols, Multi-Protocol Label Switching, IPv4 and IPv6 routing, Access Control Lists, GPON/EPON OLT functionality, Network Address Translation, and Server Load Balancing. The company sells its products directly, and through contract manufacturers and distributors to network equipment vendors. It markets its products in Israel, China, Hong Kong, the Far East, Canada, the United States, and Europe. The company was formerly known as LanOptics Ltd. and changed its name to EZchip Semiconductor Ltd. in July 2008. EZchip Semiconductor Ltd. was founded in 1989 and is based in Yokneam, Israel.

Advisors' Opinion:
  • [By Evan Niu, CFA]

    What: Shares of EZchip (NASDAQ: EZCH  ) have jumped today by as much as 13% after the company reported first-quarter earnings.

    So what: Revenue in the first quarter totaled $15.3 million, topping the Street's forecast of $15.1 million. Non-GAAP net income per share came in at $0.23, which was right on target with expectations.

  • [By Jake L'Ecuyer]

    EZchip Semiconductor (NASDAQ: EZCH) was also up, gaining 7.16 percent to $24.11 after a Cisco (NASDAQ: CSCO) announced a new product that would not threaten the company as previously thought. Equities Trading DOWN
    Shares of Cypress Semiconductor (NASDAQ: CY) were down 16.05 percent to $9.91 after the company lowered its Q3 forecast.

  • [By Lisa Levin]

    EZchip Semiconductor (NASDAQ: EZCH) surged 9.38% to $26.13. The volume of EZchip Semiconductor shares traded 407% higher than normal. EZchip Semiconductor reported better-than-expected Q1 results.

Best Small Cap Companies For 2014: KongZhong Corporation(KONG)

KongZhong Corporation, together with its subsidiaries, provides wireless interactive entertainment, media, and community services to mobile phone users in the People's Republic of China. It also involves in the development, distribution, and marketing of consumer wireless value-added services, including wireless application protocol, multimedia messaging services, short messaging services, interactive voice response services, and color ring back tones. In addition, it offers interactive entertainment services, such as mobile games, pictures, karaoke, electronic books, mobile phone personalization features, entertainment news, chat, and message boards; and through Kong.net offer news, community services, games, and other interactive media and entertainment services; and sells advertising space in the form of text-link, banner, and button advertisements. Further, the company develops and publishes mobile games, including downloadable mobile games and online mobile games cons isting of action, role-playing, and leisure games. As of December 31, 2009, it had a library of approximately 300 internally developed mobile games. Additionally, it develops online games; and provides consulting and technology services, as well as media and net book services. The company was formerly known as Communication Over The Air Inc. and changed its name to KongZhong Corporation in March 2004. KongZhong Corporation was founded in 2002 and is headquartered in Beijing, the People?s Republic of China

Advisors' Opinion:
  • [By Seth Jayson]

    Calling all cash flows
    When you are trying to buy the market's best stocks, it's worth checking up on your companies' free cash flow once a quarter or so, to see whether it bears any relationship to the net income in the headlines. That's what we do with this series. Today, we're checking in on Kongzhong (Nasdaq: KONG  ) , whose recent revenue and earnings are plotted below.

  • [By Jake L'Ecuyer]

    Top losers in the sector included China Unicom (Hong Kong) (NYSE: CHU), off 4.5 percent, and Kongzhong (NASDAQ: KONG), down 4.7 percent.

    Top Headline
    The Boeing Company (NYSE: BA) reported better-than-expected first-quarter profit. Boeing's quarterly profit declined to $965 million, or $1.28 per share, from a year-ago profit of $1.11 billion, or $1.44 per share. Its adjusted earnings surged to $1.76 per share compared to $1.73 per share. Its revenue climbed to $20.47 billion versus $18.89 billion. However, analysts were projecting earnings of $1.57 per share on revenue of $20.24 billion. For the full year, Boeing expects adjusted earnings of $7.15 to $7.35 per share.

  • [By Roberto Pedone]

    One under-$10 wireless services player that looks poised for a big spike higher is KongZhong (KONG), which is a provider of WVAS and mobile games to mobile phone users and a wireless media company providing news, content, community and mobile advertising services through its wireless Internet sites in the PRC. This stock is off to a hot start in 2013, with shares up sharply by 53%.

    If you take a look at the chart for KongZhong, you'll notice that this stock has been downtrending badly for the last two months, with shares plunging lower from its high of $14.92 to its recent low of $7.78 a share. During that downtrend, shares of KONG have been consistently making lower highs and lower lows, which is bearish technical price action. That move has now pushed shares of KONG into oversold territory, since its current relative strength index reading is 30.21. Shares of KONG are now starting to spike higher off its recent low of $7.78 a share and off its 200-day moving average of $7.95 a share. This spike could be signaling that the downside volatility for KONG is over in the short-term and the stock is ready to trend higher.

    Traders should now look for long-biased trades in KONG if it manages to break out above some near-term overhead resistance at $8.50 a share with high volume. Look for a sustained move or close above that level with volume that hits near or above its three-month average action of 519,857 shares. If that breakout triggers soon, then KONG will set up to re-test or possibly take out its next major overhead resistance levels at $10 to its 50-day moving average at $11.33 a share.

    Traders can look to buy KONG off any weakness to anticipate that breakout and simply use a stop that sits right below some key near-term support at $7.78 a share. One can also buy KONG off strength once it takes out $8.50 a share with volume and then simply use a stop that sits a comfortable percentage from your entry point.

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