I just received the year-end Smart Money magazine and I usually like to skim through before I read it. This issue recaps their 2005 picks and those apparently beat the market by 114%- not too shabby.
A small article on the Japanese market highlighted: Orix (IX), Nikko Cordial (NIKOY)
A railroad, Genesee & Wyoming (GWR), was highlighted and it seems they are growing through acquisition. This made me want to re-check that Chinese railroad (GSH).
Bill Gross (the Bond King) is a huge stamp collector. This was a small story, but he's a major stamp collector who recently paid a few million for the one stamp missing from his collection. He notes that stamps are good inflation hedges.
Their 2005 guide had some good picks, so I might as well jot down some of their 2006 picks.
In banks they like: Bank of America (BAC) and UBS (UBS)
Biotech: Amgen (AMGN) and Gilead Sciences (GILD)
Healthcare: HCA (HCA) and UnitedHealth (UNH)
Conglomerates: General Electric (GE) and Tyco (TYC)
Energy: ConocoPhillips (COP) and Devon Energy (DVN)
Telecom: Nokia (NOK- which is also on my list to look into) and Qualcomm (QCOM)
The magazine also had a roundtable and here are the picks from that: Bear Stearns (BSC), Burlingto Resources (BR), Murphy Oil (MUR), Phelps Dodge (PD), BG Group (BRG), GOL (GOL), Petrobras (PBR), Rinker (RIN), Anadarko (APC), Centex (CTX), Merrill Lynch (MER), Microsoft (MSFT), and Wal Mart (WMT)
If you have some shopping to do, someone sent me this link with coupons you can print out. There were a few good ones like 30% off any regular priced item from Borders (that one expired today though), and a few other good ones.
