Jim Cramer is the host of CNBC’s Mad Money and the chairman of TheStreet.com. Nearly 250,000 people watch his show daily on TV and most of these are ordinary investors trying to understand what’s going on in the market. Jim Cramer’s stock picks on his show is the starting point for many investments made by these folks.
During the last 30 days his favorites buy recommendations (based on number of days the stocks were mentioned) on Mad Money were as follows:
* Represents latest recommendation change from sell to buy. The study interval includes only past one year.
** Includes the duration from first date till November 10.
Cramer’s favorite stock recommendations returned 12.7% on average since they have been recommended. The average relative performance of these stocks against the S&P500 (SPY) is 8.3%. 8 of his favorite 11 stocks have managed to beat the market.
Cramer’s most favorite stock during the last 30 days was Apple. He repeated his buy recommendation of AAPL seven times during the last 30 days. Apple has gained 28.2% since November 17, 2010, beating the SPY by 19.5 percentage points. The stock has a market cap of $358 billion and P/E ratio of 13.9.
Cleveland Research Co. recently reduced their estimation for sales of the iPad from 14 million to 12 million. They also reduced their quarterly profit estimate per share from $9.89 to $9.53 for Apple. The analysts of the firm think that Amazon’s Kindle Fire’s increasing popularity will negatively affect the sales of iPad.
On the other hand, Samsung Electronics become the world’s largest smartphone vendor in the last quarter. Samsung sold 27.8 million smartphones and Apple sold 17.1 million smartphones in the last quarter. Samsung’s and Apple’s smartphone market shares are 23.8 and 14.6, respectively. We believe that Samsung is a very strong rival of Apple in the smartphone market. It seems that Samsung will continue to increase its market share and more difficult days are waiting for Apple in the near future.
Apple is also a favorite pick for Discovery Capital Management’s Rob Citrone. He has over $700 million of his fund invested in the company.
Cramer repeated his buy recommendation of EOG Resources six times during the last 30 days. EOG Resources has a market cap of $26.9 billion and P/E ratio of 25.65. EOG recently traded at $100.04 and has lost 10% since February 25, 2011, underperforming the SPY by 5.6 percentage points. Ric Dillon, Jean-Marie Eveillard, T. Boone Pickens and many other hedge fund managers were bullish about EOG. According to the presentation EOG Resources released recently, they achieved 35% growth in oil/liquid segment in 2010 and they are estimating 51% and 30% growth rates in 2011 and 2012 respectively.
Cramer’s other favorite stock during last 30 days was Verizon. He repeated his buy recommendation of VZ six times during the last 30 days. VZ has gained 20.1% since November 15, 2010, beating the SPY by 13.7 percentage points. The stock has a market cap of $106 billion, P/E ratio of 15 and dividend yield of 5.3%. Verizon have outperformed its competitors AT&T and Sprint during the last 3 months. According to RootMetrics’ recent report Verizon offers the fastest 4G mobile-data network by a landslide. The report stated, “AT&T and T-Mobile were especially close: AT&T offered 4G speed in 40.7% of our tests, while T-Mobile recorded 4G speed in 39.5% of our tests.” On the other hand, Verizon achieved 4G speed in 66% of RootMetrics’ tests.
Cramer praised Verizon’s efforts to remove the costs of operating landlines, because they aren’t making the money they need to justify operations. In light of recent labor problems and strikes, Cramer recommended this telecommunications stock because of its 5.3% yield. George Soros of Soros Fund Management increased his position by 62% (see more of George Soros’s picks).
Cramer repeated his buy recommendation of WIN six times during the last 30 days. WIN has a market cap of $6.2 billion and P/E ratio of 23.3. WIN recently traded at $11.83 and has lost 6.7% since August 12, 2010, underperforming the SPY by 9.3percentage points. Cramer advised viewers to look no further than Windstream if your portfolio needs a decent telecom stock with a strong dividend now that AT&T (T) and Verizon (VZ) have gone so high. WIN has a dividend yield of 8.3%.
