10 Best Performing Stocks To Own For 2014

Center Bancorp (CNBC) has been bringing in a lot of money for investors over the past year and even-so, a big majority of it has yet to hit the company's bottom line. As you can see from the graph below, reported net incomes have consistently improved even though the bank has close to have a year's worth of net income tucked away in allowances. And, I'm only talking about the allowance balance after all nonperforming loans are subtracted. It is very necessary to put aside this money but 3.9Xs nonperforming loans puts CNBC at one of the highest coverage ratios I've found (more the result of quickly improving NPLs than management setting aside too much money).

10 Best Performing Stocks To Own For 2014: OncoGenex Pharmaceuticals Inc.(OGXI)

OncoGenex Pharmaceuticals, Inc., a biopharmaceutical company, engages in the development and commercialization of new cancer therapies that address treatment resistance in cancer patients. The company?s clinical stage products include Custirsen, a phase III clinical stage product for treatment in men with metastatic castrate-resistant prostate cancer; OGX-427, which is in phase II clinical development stage is designed to inhibit heat shock protein 27; and SN2310 that completed phase I stage of clinical development is designed to evaluate safety in patients with advanced cancer. Its pre clinical stage products include GX-225 that is focused on reducing the production of IGFBP-2 and IGFBP-5; and CSP-9222, lead compound from a family of caspase activators. OncoGenex Pharmaceuticals, Inc. is based in Bothell, Washington.

10 Best Performing Stocks To Own For 2014: Telular Corporation(WRLS)

Telular Corporation designs, develops, and distributes products and services that utilize wireless networks to provide data and voice connectivity among people and machines primarily in the United States and internationally. It provides machine-to-machine and event monitoring services, including Telguard that comprises a specialized terminal unit, which interfaces with commercial security control panels and communicates with event processing servers to provide real-time transport of alarm signals from residential and commercial locations to an alarm company?s central monitoring station; and TankLink solution that combines a cellular communicator, wireless data services, and a Web-based application into a single offering, which allows end-users to monitor the product level in a given tank vessel. The company also offers fixed cellular terminals for voice, fax, and Internet access over the wireless networks. It sells its products to security equipment distributors, cellular carriers, and value added resellers. The company was founded in 1986 and is headquartered in Chicago, Illinois.

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By Arohan]

  Telular provides wireless connectivity solutions to home alarm and industrial segments for monitoring, security and data applications. The $89 million market value company currently can be bought at 2.42 PE ratio and offers a 6.8% dividend yield. The company reported a revenue growth of 16.6% in the latest quarter and is expected to grow earnings 16.7% this year and 43% the next. The company does not have analyst following so a deeper due diligence is advised.

Top Insurance Stocks To Buy For 2014: Telik Inc (TELK.PH)

Telik, Inc. (Telik), incorporated in 1988, is a clinical-stage drug development company focused on discovering and developing small molecule drugs to treat cancer. The Company discovers its product candidates using the Company�� drug discovery technology, Target-Related Affinity Profiling (TRAP). TELINTRA, its principal drug product candidate in clinical development, is a small molecule glutathione analog inhibitor of the enzyme glutathione S-transferase P1-1 (GST P1-1). TELCYTA, its other product candidate, is a small molecule cancer drug product candidate designed to be activated in cancer cells.

Clinical Product Development

TELINTRA is the Company�� lead small molecule product candidate in clinical development for the treatment of blood disorders, including cancer. It has a mechanism of action and acts by inhibiting GST P1-1, an enzyme that is involved in the control of cellular growth and differentiation. Inhibition of GST P1-1 results in the activation of the signaling molecule Jun kinase, a regulator of the function of blood precursor cells. Preclinical tests show that TELINTRA is capable of causing the death or apoptosis of leukemic or malignant blood cells, while stimulating the growth and development of normal blood precursor cells. TELINTRA has been studied in Myelodysplastic Syndrome (MDS) using two formulations. A liposomal formulation was developed for intravenous administration of TELINTRA and was used in Phase I and Phase II studies in MDS patients. The results from the Phase II intravenous liposomal TELINTRA clinical trials demonstrated that TELINTRA treatment was associated with improvement in all three types of blood cell levels in patients with all types of MDS, including those in intermediate and high-risk groups. An oral dosage formulation (tablet) was subsequently developed and results from a Phase I study with TELINTRA tablets showed clinical activity and the formulation to be well tole rated. In June 2011, the Company initiated a Phase II clini! c! al trial to evaluate TELINTRA tablets. In October 2011, the Company initiated an additional Phase IIb clinical trial to evaluate TELINTRA tablets. '

The activity and safety profile of tablet formulation allowed the Company to complete a Phase II trial of TELINTRA tablets in MDS. The primary objective of the Phase II TELINTRA tablet study was to determine the efficacy of TELINTRA. A multivariate logistic regression analysis was conducted to identify MDS disease prognostic factors associated with erythroid improvement response rates, including prior MDS treatment, age, gender, the international prognostic scoring system (IPSS), risk, Eastern Cooperative Group performance status, years from MDS diagnosis, MDS World Health Organization subtypes, anemia only versus anemia plus other cytopenias, dose schedule and starting dose. Results from this study show that TELINTRA is the first GSTP1-1 enzyme inhibitor shown to cause clinically reductions in red blood cell transf usions, including transfusion independence in low to intermediate-1 risk MDS patients, as well as improvement in platelet count and white blood cell levels in certain patients. TELINTRA, administered orally twice daily, appeared to be convenient and flexible for chronic treatment administration.

TELCYTA is a small molecule drug product candidate that the Company is developed for the treatment of cancer. TELCYTA binds to GST. TELCYTA has been evaluated in multiple Phase II and Phase III clinical trials, including trials using TELCYTA as monotherapy and in combination regimens in ovarian, non-small cell lung, breast and colorectal cancer. Results from these clinical trials indicate that TELCYTA monotherapy was generally well-tolerated, with mostly mild to moderate side effects, particularly when compared to the side effects and toxicities of standard chemotherapeutic drugs. When TELCYTA was evaluated in combination with standard chemotherapeutic drugs, the tolera bility of the combinations was similar to that expected! of e! ac! h drug ! alone.

Clinical activity including objective tumor responses and/or disease stabilization was reported in the TELCYTA Phase II trials; however, TELCYTA did not meet its primary endpoints in the Phase III studies. Positive results from a Phase I-IIa multicenter, dose-ranging study of TELCYTA in combination with carboplatin and paclitaxel as first-line therapy for patients with non-small cell lung cancer, or NSCLC, were published in a peer reviewed publication. Clinical data demonstrated positive results of TELCYTA in combination with carboplatin and paclitaxel in the treatment of first-line lung cancer followed by TELCYTA maintenance therapy. As of December 31, 2011, the Company had an on-going investigator-led study at a single site of TELCYTA in patients with refractory or relapsed mantle cell lymphoma, diffuse B cell lymphoma, and multiple myeloma.

Preclinical Drug Product Development

The Company has a small molecule compound, TLK60 404, in preclinical development that inhibits both Aurora kinase and VEGFR kinase. Aurora kinase is a signaling enzyme whose function is required for cancer cell division, while VEGF plays a key role in tumor blood vessel formation, ensuring an adequate supply of nutrients to support tumor growth. These lead compounds prevented tumor growth in preclinical models of human colon cancer and human leukemia by inhibiting both Aurora kinase and VEGFR kinase. A development drug product candidate, TLK60404, has been selected.

The Company, using its TRAP technology has discovered TLK60357, a novel, potent small molecule inhibitor of cell division. TLK60357 inhibits the formation of microtubules that are necessary for cancer cell growth leading to persistent G2/M cancer cell cycle block and subsequent cell death. This compound demonstrates potent broad-spectrum anticancer activity against a number of human cancer cells. This compound also displays oral efficacy in multipl e, standard preclinical models of cancer. TLK6059! 6, a pote! nt! VGFR kin! ase inhibitor, blocks the formation of new blood vessels in tumors. Oral administration of TLK60596 to animal models of human colon cancer reduced tumor growth.

10 Best Performing Stocks To Own For 2014: Prima Biomed Ltd (PRR.AX)

Prima BioMed Ltd, a biotechnology company, engages in the research and commercialization of licensed medical biotechnology products in Australia. It develops oncology therapies in the field of immunotherapy. The company�s lead product includes CVac, a cancer vaccine for patients in remission, which has completed two human clinical trials. It also manufactures mannosylated fusion protein, a critical component to CVac that contains the antigen necessary for the dendritic cells to illicit an immune response against tumor cells. In addition, the company focuses on developing oral vaccine against human papilloma virus, a virus associated with development of cervical cancer. Prima BioMed Ltd is based in Sydney, Australia.

10 Best Performing Stocks To Own For 2014: Wausau Paper Corp. (WPP)

Wausau Paper Corp. manufactures, converts, and sells paper and paper products in the United States and internationally. It operates in two segments, Tissue and Paper. The Tissue segment produces and sells paper towel and tissue products for the ?away-from-home? market, including washroom roll and folded towels, windshield folded towels, industrial wipers, dairy towels, household roll towels, and various towel, tissue, and soap dispensers, as well as other premium towel and tissue products to paper and sanitary supply distributors under the DublSoft, EcoSoft, OptiCore, Revolution, Dubl-Nature, and Dubl-Tough names. The Paper segment focuses on four core markets comprising food, industrial and tape, coated and liner, and print and color. This segment manufactures products for food processing, food packaging, and foodservice, such as products used for baking applications, microwave popcorn, and other cheese and meat processing products; products for interleaving, saturating, coating, unsaturated crepe base, and a range of micro markets; specialty liners, and siliconized release papers for use in pressure sensitive tapes, specialty label applications, the production of fiber composite applications, and casting sheets used in the production of solar cells; and uncoated printing, writing, text, cover, and board grades for commercial printers, in-plant print shops, quick printers, copy centers, and office supply and mass merchandisers under the Wausau Paper, EcoSelect, ExperTec, DuraTec, InvenTec, ProGard, ProRedi, ProPly, ProTec, Astrobrights, Royal, Exact, Professional Series, Intrigue, and Creative Collection names. This segment also produces a range of custom color products, which include matte board, end leaf, and luxury packaging applications. Wausau Paper Corp. was founded in 1899 and is headquartered in Mosinee, Wisconsin.

10 Best Performing Stocks To Own For 2014: Pinnacle Airlines Corp.(PNCL)

Pinnacle Airlines Corp., through its subsidiaries, operates as an independent regional airline company in the United States. It operates an all-regional jet fleet under two capacity purchase agreements (CPA) with Delta Air Lines, Inc. (Delta), providing regional airline capacity to Delta from Delta?s hub airports in Atlanta, Detroit, Memphis, New York City, and Minneapolis/St. Paul. The company also operates an all-turboprop fleet under a regional airline CPA with United Continental Holdings, Inc., Continental Airlines, Inc., and United Airlines, Inc. (United); and under revenue pro-rate agreements with United and US Airways Group, Inc. primarily in the northeastern United States and in Texas. As of December 31, 2010, Pinnacle Airlines Corp. offered scheduled passenger service with approximately 1,400 total daily departures to a 317 destinations with an aircraft fleet of 202 regional jet aircrafts and 81 turboprop aircrafts. The company was founded in 1985 and is headquart ered in Memphis, Tennessee.

10 Best Performing Stocks To Own For 2014: Limelight Networks Inc.(LLNW)

Limelight Networks, Inc. provides content delivery network services in North America, Europe, the Middle East, Africa, and the Asia Pacific. It offers content delivery services to deliver media files, such as video, music, games, and software, or live streaming of corporate or entertainment events; video content management services, which enable organizations to publish, manage, syndicate, analyze, and monetize video content through a cloud-based service; Web content management services that enable content publishers to create, manage, and publish Web content through a cloud-based service; and mobility and monetization services that help publishers to deliver content to media-enabled mobile handsets or tablets. The company also provides Web acceleration services, which enhance Web experiences for content, online commerce transactions, and Web applications; cloud storage services that comprise customer services for the storage of media and enterprise content; and global con sulting and technical services that enable customers optimize their publishing, e-commerce, mobility, or content distribution workflows, as well as to provide support for network architecture design, storage infrastructure, Web application development, creative design, live event execution, and design, deployment, and management of infrastructure. In addition, it offers reporting and analytics services that help customers to manage and configure content delivery and presentation. The company offers its services to traditional and emerging media companies or content providers, including businesses operating in the television, music, radio, newspaper, magazine, movie, videogame, software, and social media industries; and enterprises, technology companies, and government entities doing business online. The company was founded in 2001 and is headquartered in Tempe, Arizona.

10 Best Performing Stocks To Own For 2014: Volkswagen Ag(VKW.L)

Volkswagen Aktiengesellschaft, together with its subsidiaries, engages in the manufacture and sale of automobiles worldwide. The company operates in two divisions, Automotive and Financial Services. The Automotive division engages in the development of vehicles and engines; production and sale of passenger cars, commercial vehicles, trucks, and buses; manufacture of large-bore diesel engines for marine and stationary applications, turbochargers, turbomachinery, compressors, and chemical reactors; and production of vehicle transmissions, special gear units for wind turbines, slide bearings, and couplings, as well as testing systems for the mobility sector. Its product range extends from low-consumption small cars to luxury class vehicles; and commercial vehicle sector ranges from pick-ups to buses and heavy trucks. The Financial Services division offers dealer and customer financing, leasing, banking and insurance, and fleet management services. The company provides its pro ducts under the Volkswagen, Audi, SEAT, ?KODA, Bentley, Bugatti, Lamborghini, Volkswagen Commercial Vehicles, Scania, and MAN brand names, as well as services under the Volkswagen Financial Services brand name. It operates primarily in Europe, North America, South America, and the Asia-Pacific. The company has strategic alliances with Dr. Ing. h.c. F. Porsche AG; Daimler AG; and Chrysler Group. Volkswagen Aktiengesellschaft was founded in 1937 and is headquartered in Wolfsburg, Germany.

10 Best Performing Stocks To Own For 2014: Pebblebrook Hotel Trust(PEB)

Pebblebrook Hotel Trust, through Pebblebrook Hotel, L.P., operates as a real estate investment trust. The company acquires and invests primarily in hotel properties located in the United States. It holds interests in the Doubletree Bethesda Hotel and Executive Meeting Center located in Bethesda, Maryland; Sir Francis Drake Hotel located in San Francisco, California; and InterContinental Buckhead Hotel located in Atlanta, Georgia. As a REIT, the company is not subject to federal income tax to the extent that it distributes at least 90% of its taxable income to its shareholders. The company was founded in 2009 and is based in Bethesda, Maryland.

10 Best Performing Stocks To Own For 2014: FedEx Corporation(FDX)

FedEx Corporation provides transportation, e-commerce, and business services in the United States and internationally. It operates in four segments: FedEx Express, FedEx Ground, FedEx Freight, and FedEx Services. The FedEx Express segment offers various shipping services for the delivery of packages and freight. This segment also provides international trade services specializing in customs brokerage, and ocean and air freight forwarding services; customs clearance services, as well as global trade data, an information tool that allows customers to track and manage imports; and international trade advisory services, including assistance with the customs-trade partnership against terrorism program, as well as publishes customs duty and tax information in various customs areas. In addition, it offers supply chain solutions, including critical inventory logistics, transportation management, fulfillment, and fleet services. The FedEx Ground segment provides business and reside ntial ground package delivery services. It primarily serves customers in the small-package market in North America. The FedEx Freight segment offers less-than-truckload freight services, as well as freight-shipping services. As of May 31, 2010, this segment operated approximately 60,000 vehicles and trailers from a network of 492 service centers. The FedEx Services segment provides sales, marketing, information technology support, and customer service support services; and access to copying and digital printing through retail and Web-based platforms, signs and graphics, professional finishing, computer rentals, and a range of ground shipping and time-definite express shipping services. The company was founded in 1971 and is headquartered in Memphis, Tennessee.

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By Jeanine Poggi]

  Susan C Schwab, who is a Director at FedEx Corporation (NYSE:FDX), bought 140 shares on Sep 27 at $71.20 per share for a total value of $9,967. About the company: FedEx Corp. delivers packages and freight to multiple countries and territories throught an integrated global network. The Company provides worldwide express delivery, ground small-parcel delivery, less-than-truckload freight delivery, supply chain management services, customs brokerage services, and trade facilitation and electronic commerce solutions.

Best Clean Energy Stocks To Buy Right Now

For the past 13 years, Verizon Communications' (NYSE: VZ  ) main squeeze has Vodafone (NASDAQ: VOD  ) . The two paired up in April 2000 to found Verizon Wireless as a joint venture, which would proceed to become the largest wireless carrier in the U.S. with 98.9 million retail subscribers.

Verizon's 55% majority stake has always allowed it to call the shots, while Vodafone sits by passively with its 45% share. Speculation that Big Red is seeking to buy out that remaining 45% from Vodafone has increased in recent months, particularly as the wireless segment is where all of the growth is coming from nowadays. Vodafone CEO Vittorio Colao said he was "open" to the notion a couple months ago.

Talks are reportedly under way, but the two companies are still $30 billion apart. Verizon doesn't want to pay a penny more than $100 billion, while Vodafone thinks $130 billion is a fair asking price. However, Verizon has another trick up its sleeve.

Best Clean Energy Stocks To Buy Right Now: Liberty Global Inc.(LBTYA)

Liberty Global, Inc. provides video, broadband Internet, and telephony services primarily in Europe and Chile. The company offers broadband services over cable distribution systems, including video, broadband Internet, and telephony; and video services through direct-to-home satellite, or through multichannel multipoint distribution systems. Its analog video services comprise basic and expanded basic programming; and digital cable services include basic and premium programming, digital video recorders, and high definition programming, as well as pay-per-view programming, such as video-on-demand and near video-on-demand. In addition, the company offers voice-over-Internet-protocol and circuit-switched telephony services, as well as mobile telephony services using third-party networks. Further, it owns programming networks that provide video programming channels to multi-channel distribution systems owned by the company and the third parties. As of December 31, 2011, the com pany owned and operated networks that passed 33,262,100 homes; and served 18,405,500 video subscribers, 8,159,300 broadband Internet subscribers, and 6,225,300 telephony subscribers. Liberty Global, Inc. was founded in 2004 and is based in Englewood, Colorado.

Best Clean Energy Stocks To Buy Right Now: Potash Corporation of Saskatchewan Inc.(POT)

Potash Corporation of Saskatchewan Inc. produces and sells fertilizers and related industrial and feed products primarily in the United States and Canada. The company mines and produces potash, which is used as fertilizer. It also offers solid and liquid phosphate fertilizers; animal feed supplements; and industrial acids that are used in food products and industrial processes. In addition, the company produces nitrogen fertilizers, as well as nitrogen feed and industrial products, including ammonia, urea, nitrogen solutions, ammonium nitrate, and nitric acid. Further, it holds the right to mine 785,759 acres of land in Saskatchewan; and 58,263 acres of land in New Brunswick in Canada. The company sells its fertilizers primarily to retailers, dealers, co-operatives, distributors, and other fertilizer producers; industrial products primarily to chemical product manufacturers; and purified phosphoric acid directly to consumers of the product. Potash Corporation was founded i n 1953 and is based in Saskatoon, Canada.

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By Fabian]

  Potash Corp. of Saskatchewan (POT) produces fertilizers, agricultural
  chemicals and feed products — primarily its namesake “potash,” or potassium carbonate mixed with other nutrients. Though this company is down dramatically from its highs in 2008, I think POT has bottomed out and now investor sentiment is turning around.

  For instance, Potash’s moved 1.1 million tons of crop nutrients in the fourth quarter, which was down compared to the previous quarter, but the 23% slide was a dramatic improvement over the 65% decline for the full year. Potash has been struggling to find a right production target, and I feel like the company is close to an effective target.

  What’s more, potash prices could be on the rise globally after leading exporter Belarussian Potash Co. boosted prices by more than 6% in Brazil and Asia. That means companies like POT can also command a higher price — and deliver bigger profits going forward.

• [By Vita]

  People need to eat. Potash increases the yield of fertilizer. And in an overpopulated world with people moving into urban areas (less farmers feeding more mouths), demand will spike for whatever can increase that yield. Potash's stock is closely correlated to prices of the product Potash. It's worth noting that the stock represents billionaire financier George Soros's third largest position. Goldman Sachs just raised its rating on the the stock, saying "Investors are likely underestimating the 2012 US demand recovery that could see staggering yoy [year- over-year] percent increases in volume given the depth of the 2011 reduction and the atypically weak fall consumption levels."

5 Best Small Cap Stocks To Buy Right Now: Goldman Sachs Group Inc.(The)

The Goldman Sachs Group, Inc., together with its subsidiaries, provides investment banking, securities, and investment management services to corporations, financial institutions, governments, and high-net-worth individuals worldwide. Its Investment Banking segment offers financial advisory, including advisory assignments with respect to mergers and acquisitions, divestitures, corporate defense, risk management, restructurings, and spin-offs; and underwriting securities, loans and other financial instruments, and derivative transactions. The company?s Institutional Client Services segment provides client execution activities, such as fixed income, currency, and commodities client execution related to making markets in interest rate products, credit products, mortgages, currencies, and commodities; and equities related to making markets in equity products, as well as commissions and fees from executing and clearing institutional client transactions on stock, options, and fu tures exchanges. This segment also engages in the securities services business providing financing, securities lending, and other prime brokerage services to institutional clients, including hedge funds, mutual funds, pension funds, and foundations. Its Investing and Lending segment invests in debt securities, loans, public and private equity securities, real estate, consolidated investment entities, and power generation facilities. This segment also involves in the origination of loans to provide financing to clients. The company?s Investment Management segment provides investment management services and investment products to institutional and individual clients. This segment also offers wealth advisory services, including portfolio management and financial counseling, and brokerage and other transaction services to high-net-worth individuals and families. In addition, it provides global investment research services. The company was founded in 1869 and is headquartered in New York, New York.

Best Clean Energy Stocks To Buy Right Now: China Grentech Corporation Limited(GRRF)

China GrenTech Corporation Limited, together with its subsidiaries, engages in the manufacture and sale of wireless coverage products and services in the People?s Republic of China. The company offers a range of wireless coverage products that include repeaters, trunk amplifiers, and base station amplifiers that support various 2G protocols, including GSM and CDMA, and 3G protocols comprising TD-SCDMA, WCDMA, and CDMA2000. It provides its wireless coverage products in indoor coverage areas, such as high-rise buildings, underground areas, and elevators; and outdoor coverage areas comprising highways, railways, subways, and tunnels. China GrenTech also offers design, installation of wireless coverage products, and project warranty services. In addition, it engages in the development, manufacture, and supply of RF parts and components that include transistors and diodes; and filters, duplexers, multi-frequency splitters, combiners and couplers, and antennae. The company was f ormerly known as Powercom Holdings Limited. China GrenTech Corporation Limited was founded in 1999 and is based in Shenzhen, the People?s Republic of China.

Fibria Celulose Increases Sales but Misses Estimates on Earnings

Fibria Celulose (NYSE: FBR  ) reported earnings on July 24. Here are the numbers you need to know.

The 10-second takeaway
For the quarter ended June 30 (Q2), Fibria Celulose met expectations on revenues and missed expectations on earnings per share.

Compared to the prior-year quarter, revenue increased slightly. Non-GAAP loss per share increased. GAAP loss per share grew.

Gross margins grew, operating margins grew, net margins dropped.

Revenue details
Fibria Celulose booked revenue of $753.2 million. The 10 analysts polled by S&P Capital IQ expected revenue of $748.3 million on the same basis. GAAP reported sales were the same as the prior-year quarter's.

Source: S&P Capital IQ. Quarterly periods. Dollar amounts in millions. Non-GAAP figures may vary to maintain comparability with estimates.

EPS details
EPS came in at -$0.48. The five earnings estimates compiled by S&P Capital IQ predicted -$0.26 per share. Non-GAAP EPS were -$0.48 for Q2 compared to -$0.44 per share for the prior-year quarter. GAAP EPS were -$0.49 for Q2 versus -$0.44 per share for the prior-year quarter.

Source: S&P Capital IQ. Quarterly periods. Non-GAAP figures may vary to maintain comparability with estimates.

Margin details
For the quarter, gross margin was 19.9%, 360 basis points better than the prior-year quarter. Operating margin was 8.6%, 350 basis points better than the prior-year quarter. Net margin was -35.7%, 40 basis points worse than the prior-year quarter. (Margins calculated in GAAP terms.)

Looking ahead
Next quarter's average estimate for revenue is $807.1 million. On the bottom line, the average EPS estimate is $0.00.

Next year's average estimate for revenue is $2.95 billion. The average EPS estimate is -$0.07.

Investor sentiment
The stock has a three-star rating (out of five) at Motley Fool CAPS, with 212 members out of 225 rating the stock outperform, and 13 members rating it underperform. Among 52 CAPS All-Star picks (recommendations by the highest-ranked CAPS members), 49 give Fibria Celulose a green thumbs-up, and three give it a red thumbs-down.

Of Wall Street recommendations tracked by S&P Capital IQ, the average opinion on Fibria Celulose is hold, with an average price target of $12.26.

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Intuitive Surgical Increases Buybacks to $1.5 Billion

With $721 million remaining on an existing share repurchase authorization, robotic-surgery specialist Intuitive Surgical (NASDAQ: ISRG  ) said it will add another $779 million to the buyback program, bringing the total to approximately $1.5 billion.

Additionally, in connection with the buyback, Intuitive Surgical also said it was entering into an accelerated repurchase agreement with Goldman Sachs (NYSE: GS  ) to buy $500 million worth of company stock. Most of the shares to be bought back from the investment house will be delivered in two weeks' time, with the remaining shares to be received and retired by Oct. 29.

Intuitive Surgical President and CEO Dr. Gary S. Guthart said, "Our program to repurchase $1.5 billion in Intuitive Surgical stock, including $500 million on an accelerated basis, demonstrates our commitment to our shareholders as well as our confidence in the da Vinci surgical system and the benefits it brings to patients."

The remaining $1 billion on the authorization will be made through cash and investments, of which it had approximately $3 billion worth on hand. The buybacks will be made depending on market conditions, but Intuitive Surgical cautions that the program may also be suspended or terminated at any time.

Are You Expecting This from Ferro?

Ferro (NYSE: FOE  ) is expected to report Q2 earnings around July 25. Here's what Wall Street wants to see:

The 10-second takeaway
Comparing the upcoming quarter to the prior-year quarter, average analyst estimates predict Ferro's revenues will wane -8.3% and EPS will grow 120.0%.

The average estimate for revenue is $441.5 million. On the bottom line, the average EPS estimate is $0.11.

Revenue details
Last quarter, Ferro reported revenue of $417.5 million. GAAP reported sales were 9.3% lower than the prior-year quarter's $460.4 million.

Source: S&P Capital IQ. Quarterly periods. Dollar amounts in millions. Non-GAAP figures may vary to maintain comparability with estimates.

EPS details
Last quarter, non-GAAP EPS came in at $0.10. GAAP EPS of $0.01 for Q1 were 75% lower than the prior-year quarter's $0.04 per share.

Source: S&P Capital IQ. Quarterly periods. Non-GAAP figures may vary to maintain comparability with estimates.

Recent performance
For the preceding quarter, gross margin was 19.0%, 40 basis points better than the prior-year quarter. Operating margin was 4.3%, 130 basis points better than the prior-year quarter. Net margin was 0.2%, 60 basis points worse than the prior-year quarter.

Looking ahead

The full year's average estimate for revenue is $1.67 billion. The average EPS estimate is $0.36.

Investor sentiment
The stock has a three-star rating (out of five) at Motley Fool CAPS, with 133 members out of 152 rating the stock outperform, and 19 members rating it underperform. Among 55 CAPS All-Star picks (recommendations by the highest-ranked CAPS members), 54 give Ferro a green thumbs-up, and one give it a red thumbs-down.

Of Wall Street recommendations tracked by S&P Capital IQ, the average opinion on Ferro is hold, with an average price target of $7.13.

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The Future of Apple Is Everywhere

The genius of Apple's (NASDAQ: AAPL  ) product innovation is that Apple has found a way to think years, even decades ahead of consumers. It revolutionized what we thought about cell phones, created an app model that didn't previously exist, and is currently taking steps to connect us to everything, all the time.

Don't get fooled by the product announcements most people focus on; it's the software that Apple will use to differentiate itself in the future. Airplay allows your Apple devices to communicate with each other, AirDrop makes other devices accessible, and iCloud stores photos, music, and soon passwords that pull you in and keep you in the ecosystem.

Slowly, these products creep into our daily usage and become a natural extension of us. Turn the lights on remotely, check your security camera, change a file on your smartphone, and beam anything to the nearest Apple-powered screen.

What Apple is doing is making the device itself ubiquitous. Wherever or whenever it's convenient to do what you need to do, from business to recreation, on any of your Apple devices, a solution will be available. Wi-Fi, iCloud, AirDrop, and AirPlay are just the ways Apple uses to connect them and make sure Apple is everywhere.

The next step
Don't think the iWatch or iTV product rumors will just be devices on their own. The point is to connect you even more to the Apple ecosystem. An iWatch could be an extension of an iPhone or iPad, relaying iMessages, emails, and of course music. The iTV could be a screen for AirPlay, a cable replacement, or your home movie theater, all through Apple services and devices.

The connectivity of these devices is probably more important than anything else because that allows Apple to create a user experience no one can match.

Can the competition catch up?
Google is a larger player in smartphones and is on Apple's heels in tablets, but it lags behind in a few key ways. Consumers don't update its operating system, and it doesn't have a viable TV offering yet. In many ways, Google is ahead of Apple from a software and cloud perspective, but it doesn't make all of those services available to all devices right away like Apple does.

Microsoft has smartphones, tablets, and TV access with Xbox One, but its installed base is so small that developers don't leverage the ecosystem the way Apple's do. I think Microsoft is Apple's biggest challenger, but the price of Xbox One is a hurdle and people don't seem to be thrilled about using Windows for mobile just yet.

When it comes to connectivity, Apple has a huge lead in access and usability and Google and Microsoft are playing catch-up. Pay attention to how Apple's new product announcements this year enhance connectivity and function between devices, not just how the device itself works, because that's where Apple is building a real advantage.

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The Secret to a Successful Kiosk? Location, Location, Location

The Motley Fool is on the road in Seattle! Recently, we visited Coinstar -- now officially renamed Outerwall  (NASDAQ: OUTR  ) -- to speak with CFO-turned-CEO Scott Di Valerio about the 22-year-old company's well-known coin-cashing machines, as well as its more recent acquisition of Redbox, and future initiatives to expand into other aspects of the automated retail market.

Coinstar works with most of the leading grocery and mass merchandise chains. In this video segment Scott discusses which types of kiosks are best suited to which channels, and who the company would really like to work with. The full version of the interview can be watched here.

A full transcript follows the video.

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Austin Smith: You guys, it seems, have retail relationships with everybody. You've got Safeway, Wal-Mart, CVS, Walgreen's I think we talked about earlier. I'm sure they're all great partners, but what's your favorite retail partner and why?

Is there one that just provides really great entry points for you, that you really enjoy working with, or do you see a lot of use from your machines at certain locations?

Scott Di Valerio: It really depends on the business. For the coin business, what we've found is grocery and mass merch is the best way to go. It has enough traffic and has a high enough traffic pace to where people come into the stores and utilize machines and those kinds of things. The drug and convenience channel really don't work for the coin business.

We look at it from that perspective. A new, emerging market for us -- channel for us, I should say -- for the coin business is the financial institution business. We just put 350 kiosks in, in TD Bank Canada, and are processing points for TD Bank, and we're looking to expand.

We have a few machines in the U.S. today in the banking or financial institution channel and we're looking to expand that out as we go out.

It really depends on business from a channel perspective. When we look at Redbox, for example, we're in the grocery channel, we're in the mass merch channel, we're in convenience and we're in drug, but we have the machines located at different places.

For convenience and drug, we're primarily outdoors. What that allows us to do is be open for 24 hours a day, it allows customers to see the machine, and it gets the right amount of traffic, both for us and as well for our retailers. And, again, it utilizes space that's very underutilized and turns it into very profitable space as well.

We really do focus based on the channel. If I look at some of our new businesses like Rubi, the grocery channel will be a very good channel for us. The mass merch channel will be a very good channel for us as well. I think we really do try to take a look at it based on the channels, as opposed to an individual retailer that's out there.

Austin: It's the right channel, the right placement, and the right machine is really what dictates it.

Di Valerio: Exactly.

Austin: Who would be the best retail partner that you don't already have? Who do you really want to become a partner with, that you haven't already tied the knot?

Di Valerio: We're very fortunate in the Redbox business, for example, that we have the top 10 national grocery chains under our banners. We have Wal-Mart, which is the largest mass merch center, as well as CVS and Walgreen's in the drug channel, and 7-Eleven and Circle K in convenience, so we have very, very strong channel space there.

With the coin business, we have nine of the 10 grocery chains under the coin banner, and Wal-Mart as well in the mass merch, so we have very strong relationships, as you've mentioned, across there. Certainly there are a couple on the coin side.

There's one grocery chain that we don't have, which we would love to bring up underneath the banner, which is Publix. Certainly, we always are looking and talking to Target as another large mass merch, to see if there are some opportunities with them for some of our businesses on a general basis.

Two Stocks Walloping the Dow as Worldwide Markets Drop

The Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJINDICES: ^DJI  ) is basically unchanged as markets around the world drop in response to the possible slowing of the Fed's QE3 and poor data on Chinese manufacturing. As of 1:10 p.m. EDT the Dow is down 7 points, or %, to 15,300. The S&P 500 (SNPINDEX: ^GSPC  ) is down % to . 

There were four U.S. economic releases today.

Report

Period

Result

Previous

Weekly new unemployment claims	May 11 to May 18	340,000	360,000
Markit Flash PMI	May	51.9	52.1
FHFA Home Price Index	Q1	1.9%	1.5%
New-home sales	April	454,000	444,000

Source: MarketWatch U.S. Economic Calendar.

The U.S. economic releases are being overshadowed by fears over the Fed's possible slowing of QE3 and negative economic data out of China.

QE3 is the Federal Reserve program of buying $45 billion in long-term Treasuries and $40 billion of mortgage-backed securities each month. Yesterday, Bernanke testified before Congress' Joint Economic Committee, and while he was noncommittal, he said the Fed could begin slowing purchases at one of the next few meetings. Then, the minutes from the May 1 Federal Open Market Committee meeting showed that some members want to slow or stop purchases as soon as next month.

It remains to be seen what the Fed will do. The Fed has stated before that purchases will continue until inflation expectations go above 2.5% or unemployment drops to 6.5%. Inflation is currently just above 1%, while unemployment is at 7.5% and continues to decline.

Second, manufacturing activity in China has been slowing, and today HSBC reported that its Chinese purchasing managers index showed that manufacturing activity contracted in may: The index dropped to 49.6 in May from 50.4 in April. A reading of more than 50 indicates expansion, while a reading of less than 50 indicates contraction.

In response, both Asian markets and European markets sold off. The Nikkei finished 7.3% lower, Hong Kong's Hang Seng index finished 2.5% lower, and Europ's FTSE finished down 2%.

Today's Dow leader
Today's Dow leader is Hewlett-Packard (NYSE: HPQ  ) , up 13.5% after it reported second-quarter earnings last night. The PC manufacturer reported earnings per share of $0.87 and revenue of $27.6 billion, whereas analysts had expected EPS of $0.81 and revenue of $28 billion. HP has been weighed down by a declining PC market, as well as terrible capital-allocation decisions on its part. These combined last year to send Hewlett-Packard stock down to just $11.35. But the stock has roared back this year, up 70% year to date to $24.11 after the sell-off went too far.

The massive wave of mobile computing has done much to unseat the major players in the PC market, including venerable technology names like Hewlett-Packard. However, HP is rapidly shifting its strategy under the leadership of CEO Meg Whitman. But does this make HP one of the least-appreciated turnaround stories on the market, or is this a minor detour on its road to irrelevance? The Motley Fool's technology analyst details exactly what investors need to know about HP in our new premium research report. Just click here now to get your copy today.

Second for the Dow today is Boeing (NYSE: BA  ) , up 1.7%. Today Chinese authorities approved Boeing's 787 Dreamliner for use in China. Approval had been a long time coming and was further delayed when the FAA grounded the craft at the start of the year due to problems with its lithium-ion battery. Before the Dreamliner was cleared for flight, Chinese airlines had ordered just 35 Dreamliners. Today's decision opens up a vast new market for Boeing's newest jet.

What to Watch With 3M's Stock

3M (NYSE: MMM  ) has gained 33% over the past year, when including dividends, and for the company to continue that strong performance investors will expect more growth than we've seen recently. Organic growth was just 2.9% in the first quarter, which isn't impressive, but the good news is that the company is investing more in R&D to fuel growth. Motley Fool contributor Travis Hoium covers what investors should be watching for regarding 3M's stock. 

Companies such as 3M have leveraged low costs in China to expand margins, but these days it's all about speed in R&D and manufacturing. 3M is one of thousands of companies using new technology to turn products into reality almost in real-time, changing everything we thought we knew about manufacturing. Read all about the biggest industry disrupters since the personal computer in "3 Stocks to Own for the New Industrial Revolution". Just click here to learn more.

Why Ruby Tuesday Shares Got Trashed

Although we don't believe in timing the market or panicking over market movements, we do like to keep an eye on big changes -- just in case they're material to our investing thesis.

What: Shares of Ruby Tuesday (NYSE: RT  ) were giving investors indigestion today, falling as much as 17% after a lackluster fourth-quarter earnings report.

So what: The restaurant chain reported a $0.12 adjusted-per-share profit, short of expectations of $0.19. Without excluding those additional items, Ruby Tuesday would have seen a $0.49 per-share loss. Revenue was down 11%, to $316.1 million, as it closed some restaurants in the past year, while same-store sales at namesake Ruby Tuesday restaurants dipped 3.1% in company-owned locations, and 5.1% at franchises, indicating organic weakness. CEO JJ Buettgen said the company sees a same-store sales decline of high-single digits in the current quarter, but expects it to turn positive in the second half of the fiscal year due to new menu items and marketing campaigns.

Now what: It's hard to see the positive in this report, but the company is in a transitional phase, having exited the chains Marlin & Ray's, Truffles Grill, and Wok Hay over the past year, in order to focus on the core Ruby Tuesday business, and growing Lime Fresh, a Chipotle competitor. Lime Fresh may be valuable as a future revenue stream, but the company did take a goodwill impairment charge last quarter for its earlier acquisition, which seems to bode poorly. And with just 24 Lime Fresh locations in operation, compared to 783 Ruby Tuesday locations, the vast majority of the business is in its namesake brand. At the very least, I'd wait to see comparable sales moving in the right direction before putting faith in Ruby Tuesday.  

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Will Cans Bring Wine Out of the Cellar?

Sacre bleu! If cans are the salvation of craft beer, are they good enough for wine, too? 

It's actually been a long time since the fermented grape drink was solely the product of a corked glass bottle, as the industry was set on its head by the introduction of the twist-off cap, while wine-in-a-box eliminated the bottle altogether. Although canned wines have been around for about a decade, you probably won't find too many sommeliers sipping vino from a can, but it may help spur more sales by allowing consumers to take wine to more places than it's currently allowed.

That was one of the primary motivators behind Boston Beer (NYSE: SAM  ) finally serving its flagship Samuel Adams brand in a can. Because public places like beaches and ballparks prohibit bringing glass bottles to the venue, it was limiting sales -- though there was likely a lot more than that behind falling sales of its premier brand. And the brewer doesn't really think it will have many new drinkers bellying up to the bar for its beer, but rather the can gives its current brew lovers (count me among them) more opportunities to enjoy their beer.

Craft beers in general have been more than willing to, er, bottle their brews in cans without loss of taste, but there's been a much longer history of beer in a can, so the hurdle wasn't as high, even among beer snobs. Vintners, on the other hand, have a much taller barrier to surmount, though boxed wine has probably knocked it down a peg or two.

According to a recent BusinessWeek article, boxed-wine maker Franzia is the world's best-selling brand, though it has a less than 1% share of the market globally (but 6.5% in North America).

Yet wine producers are facing some significant challenges these days. Constellation Brands (NYSE: STZ  ) , the largest wine producer in the world and the biggest premium wine producer in the U.S. with more than $1.7 billion in annual sales, is only expecting growth to match the rise in the overall industry of the mid-single digits. It's actually looking for the Modelo beer business that it acquired from Anheuser-Busch InBev to drive its growth in the future.

Part of the problem is the changing tastes of consumers. In addition to craft beer's popularity, hard ciders and teas are gaining popularity, too. Boston Beer saw depletions grow 16% last quarter primarily because of the emphasis it placed on its Angry Orchard cider and Twisted Teas, and Bud recently introduced its Stella Artois Cidre brand. Last year, both SABMiller and Molson Coors (NYSE: TAP  ) acquired cider maker Crispin through their MillerCoors joint venture.

The brewers don't have much fear of diluting beer sales, though, because cider is seen as an alternative to wine, not beer. But innovative packaging such as canned wine may also allow wine producers to maintain, if not gain, drinkers. Spirit Airlines, for example, recently announced it was going to start serving wine in cans along with the little nips bottles it currently offers.

Wine has enjoyed some heady growth in recent years, and even in the Great White North, its market share has jumped from 24% to 31% between 2002 and 2012. So if vintners can get wine onto beaches and ballparks just as the brewers hope, they may yet have something to pop their corks over.

Norfolk Southern: Raising Its Dividend As Coal Revenues Drive Earnings Lower

Why Micrel Shares Jumped Temporarily

Although we don't believe in timing the market or panicking over market movements, we do like to keep an eye on big changes -- just in case they're material to our investing thesis.

What: Shares of Micrel (NASDAQ: MCRL  ) jumped temporarily this morning, up by as much as 10% before giving back nearly all of those gains, following first-quarter earnings.

So what: Revenue in the quarter was $59.7 million, with non-GAAP net income per share of $0.11. The results were mixed relative to expectations, since the Street was modeling for $61.2 million in sales and $0.07 per share in adjusted profit. Investors may have initially rallied at the earnings beat, but cautious comments put a damper on the optimism.

Now what: CEO Ray Zinn acknowledged that the company continues to face macroeconomic challenges, with weakness in the computing and communications end markets. Growth in the consumer end market only partially offset the headwinds. Micrel expects second-quarter sales to increase 2% to 6% sequentially, with gross margin expected in the range of 51% to 52%. Earnings per share should be $0.07 to $0.09, meaning the company will have to hit the high end to match the consensus estimate.

Interested in more info on Micrel? Add it to your watchlist by clicking here.

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Will These Big Moves Boost Tomorrow's AT&T Earnings?

AT&T (NYSE: T  ) is scheduled to release its quarterly earnings report tomorrow, and with the company having successfully created a huge wireless network covering the U.S., its prospects look bright. But if you're expecting strong share-price appreciation to go with the telecom stock's dividend, then the sluggishness in AT&T earnings growth will likely disappoint you.

AT&T pays a higher dividend than any other stock in the Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJINDICES: ^DJI  ) , hearkening back to its utility-like roots. But competitive pressures are forcing the company to take major steps to defend its key market position in the wireless industry and to find new potential revenue sources. Let's take an early look at what's been happening with AT&T over the past quarter and what we're likely to see in its quarterly report.

Stats on AT&T

Analyst EPS Estimate	$0.68
Change From Year-Ago EPS	3.3%
Revenue Estimate	$31.81 billion
Change From Year-Ago Revenue	0.8%
Earnings Beats in Past 4 Quarters	2

Source: Yahoo! Finance.

Can AT&T earnings grow faster this quarter?
Analysts have recently reduced their views on AT&T earnings by a modest amount, cutting $0.03 per share from both their June-quarter estimates and their full-year 2013 consensus. The stock has been similarly lackluster, falling 4% since mid-April.

The big news for AT&T is its announcement last week that it would buy Leap Wireless (NASDAQ: LEAP  ) in a $1.2 billion deal. After failing to take over T-Mobile, AT&T clearly wanted a combination that would bolster its wireless-spectrum assets and help give it room for future growth. AT&T offered a huge premium to the prevailing share price, as well as a kicker from the sale of a block of Leap spectrum. Still, some believe another bidder could emerge to make AT&T fight harder for Leap.

Still, the Leap deal doesn't address a more fundamental problem that AT&T is struggling with: how to find growth in a largely saturated U.S. market. During the past quarter, speculation that it might partner with Verizon (NYSE: VZ  ) to buy out Vodafone, with AT&T getting Vodafone's international assets, hasn't led to any concrete results. Similarly, reports that AT&T could be looking at Spain's Telefonica haven't gone anywhere, either.

With that in mind, AT&T has sought to maximize the value of its existing business. One step that AT&T and its peers have taken to try to bolster earnings is to tackle subsidies. The recent AT&T Next program allows customers to upgrade devices every year, charging monthly installments of $15 to $50 depending on what smartphone they choose. Rivals are jumping onto that bandwagon as well, with T-Mobile having started the ball rolling with its Jump program and with Verizon having more recently announced its Edge initiative, but the goal of all of these programs is to encourage more upgrading without getting stuck with the full subsidy cost of the devices.

In tomorrow's AT&T earnings report, watch for hints about where the company sees the bulk of its future growth coming from, as well as more information on its Leap Wireless buyout. With some analysts convinced that the company overpaid for Leap, it will be crucial for the company demonstrate the positive impact on earnings that it expects the deal to produce in the long run.

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How To Make Earnings Estimates For Non Pro Analysts

Over the past few years running Estimize I've had countless people ask me to write a post on how to make earnings estimates. Before I get into that, let me very briefly explain why this is even important to most traders and investors with a time frame greater than a few days, or anyone holding or trading into and out of earnings.

1. The price of any asset is a function of supply and demand, and those two things are based on sentiment, not pure math. Why do some stocks in the same industry trade for 30 times earnings while others trade for 10 times? Sentiment. A large piece of that sentiment is often the future outlook for the fundamentals of the company (earnings, revenue, margins, the growth of various lines of the business). Estimates on these data points are extremely important, they are one half of the puzzle to price, the other half being the multiple the market gives them (more on that later).

2. Other traders and investors are looking at estimates, which is why you need to be looking at them as well, and understanding what your expectations are given your position in that stock. Just as in technical analysis where any given indicator or trend line is only as important as the number of people looking at it, earnings are a large factor in how most traders and investors make decisions. So if the market is paying attention to it, you better understand the sentiment around what people expect and how they may react to various outcomes.

3. The big boys (Fidelity, BlackRock, Vanguard…) aren't investing for tomorrow, or next week, or even next month. These guys need to pump so much money into stocks to move the needle on their returns that they are looking out 2-5 years. When that's your timeframe for putting money into a company, it's all about expected growth. The timing of their entry into these small/mid cap stocks is often dependent on a large acceleration in that growth, some inflection point that gives them a lot of confidence that they can pump all that! money in now, move the market, pay a premium, and be around to see the meat of the move over the next few years. See Tesla (TSLA) as an example currently of this behavior. Earnings estimates play in to this by being the bedrock of the forecast, because at some point the company does have to live up to a reasonable multiple of earnings, revenue, or some other fundamental metric that the market will attempt to compare to other companies in its industry. The estimates drive supply and demand for the stock.

Ok, enough with that schpiel. I'm going to run through how I make earnings and revenue estimates. Just for quick background, my training was not in building big earnings models in Excel, I've never talked directly to management of any public company about their outlook, and I've never done a proper channel check. This stuff, as I'm about to show you, is completely irrelevant to you unless you are the senior analyst at Fidelity or some $10B hedge fund. My training is in writing algorithms to find a specific set of companies with specific characteristics at a specific time, put together a decent guess regarding where their fundamentals are headed, and then trade them based on the technicals and sentiment on an intermediate term time frame. This stuff is not rocket science, just about anyone can have an informed opinion, here's how.

We're going to use Michael Kors (KORS) as our primary example here. It's a company that's pretty well known, a stock that's being accumulated by large institutions, it's had great momentum, it's growing quickly, and there is a large discrepancy between the sell side consensus and the actual results from the company, as well as the company's own guidance and its performance. All of these things factor into making estimates, so this will be a rich example.

The following things do not have to be considered in this order, but this is generally how I look at it.

1. What is the sell side expecting? Sell side analysts to a pretty decent job at forecast! ing earni! ngs, they just don't do a great job in that last mile, that's where you can add value. The sell side consensus is a baseline scenario that has a lot of inherent bias. But there's a lot of signal there, and they basically get you 80% of the way to your estimate before you look at anything else.

So take a look at where the high, low, and consensus are for the current quarter. If you don't have Bloomberg, go to Yahoo Finance and look it up, here's the page.

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So it looks like while the range of estimates for EPS is not that wide, there is large disagreement amongst analysts regarding KORS revenue growth. Most of the time your estimates will fall within these ranges, not always, but most of the time. While the distribution of sell side estimates is often very small, everyone being close to eachother, I would say there is almost always one guy who makes an aggressive estimate in either direction, which gives you a pretty good sanity check regarding what an acceptable range is.

Let's take a look at the Estimize charts now.

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As you can see, there is a history here of the sell side being far too conservative with both the EPS and Revenue for KORS. It looks like their margin assumptions have been pretty accurate, they've just far undercut the true growth of the revenue, which has led to their EPS estimates ! being far! too low as well.

We often see this pattern in young high growth companies, and it normally doesn't stop until the growth slows significantly. Given the history here, we would expect that if our growth assumptions aren't terrible, they should crush the sell side estimates again. And unless we believe that something dramatic has changed in the margins for KORS, the sell side calculation should be pretty accurate once again. Personally I have no clue what that number actually is, but it's not hard to eyeball.

We also want to look at the trend in revisions for EPS and Revenue.

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A few things are important to remember here. On average, the sell side consensus is about 10% too optimistic 3 months before the company reports. On average, the sell side consensus is too conservative 2 weeks to 1 day before the report. Sell side analysts love to lower their estimates right before the report so that the company can beat them. Now, we don't see this pattern as much in KORS because it's such a high growth company, the sell side is just trying to keep up. In this case, positive revisions are a great sign that KORS is going to put up great numbers again, because if the sell side got even a whiff of bad news, they would be taking these down faster than a freshman at a college frat initiation drinks beer.

It looks like while margin assumptions have not changed through the quarter, the sell side has started that process of tempering their growth expectations as we approach the report date in early August. Given this trend, I wouldn't expect these numbers to move significantly between now and the report unless the company changes guidance or one of its competitors says something interesting.

So that's t! he sell s! ide. It's gotten us 90% of the way to our estimate. But now let's add the last mile.

2. Revenue growth rates are extremely important to stocks showing great momentum. Remember to take into consideration that it's really hard for companies to continually grow revenue at over 50-60% YOY once they hit a certain size. This is just the reality of large numbers. While the market may crush a company that goes from 30% growth to 15% growth in one quarter, it won't necessarily do so for one steadily going from 100% to 90% to 80% to 70% at a steady rate. Let's take a look at the numbers from KORS.

(click to enlarge)

KORS has seen its revenue growth rate decline, but it's still growing at a huge clip given its size. We want to look at a few things here. When it reported a 57% YOY growth rate last quarter, what comp was it up against? Looks like it grew 71% the year before, which was huge. Remember to always look at the comp from the year before, it will give you a good sanity check for the ability of the company to hit those kind of numbers this year. Growing 70% off a flat quarter the year before is a lot easier than growing 70% off a 70% increase the year before.

Then you want to look at what the comp is this quarter compared to last quarter. In this case they are up against a 73% comp vs a 71% comp last quarter. Given that we shouldn't expect a company like KORS to be increasing their revenue growth at this point given their size, we can expect that growth is going to be slower this quarter than it was last. How much slower? Well, the comp isn't that much bigger, so that shouldn't have a big impact on our projections. The sell side consensus is expecting about 37.5% YOY revenue growth. Given that they did 57% against a similar comp, I would say that this is way too low. Do you think that the growth rate really plummeted that much in one quarter? No.

So now we play around with the n! umbers. W! here do we think that growth rate really is. Couple this with the average variance between the sell side consensus and the actual results from the company and we're starting to build a picture. An estimate of $610M for the quarter would put KORS at a 47% YOY growth rate. This seems more realistic.

One more thing to consider regarding growth rates. When it comes to anything retail, you need to take into account how fast a company can build more stores. For a company like WholeFoods (WFM), that's a big issue. You can't just build 500 stores a quarter when you want to, these things take time. There's also the issue of saturation. Understanding where they are in that cycle is important. Also, regarding margins, new stores have lower margins, it takes time for them to get up and running at full speed, so if a company like WholeFoods builds a ton of stores one quarter, expect a dip in margins. The next quarter, expect those margins to recover.

3. Pay attention to the company's guidance. The best and most prolific example is the sandbag job that Apple (AAPL) used to do every quarter. Companies in high revenue growth mode will almost always sandbag guidance because there's really no reason for them to be honest. They are already growing at a good clip, so telling the market they will be at 30% YOY instead of 45% YOY isn't gonna hurt the stock, that is unless it's LinkedIn (LNKD) last quarter, in which case the market had a stupid reaction (see stock at new highs now). The market can be dumb sometimes, it creates opportunities for the rest of us.

We don't show the company's guidance on Estimize, though we are trying to get our hands on this data feed (call us if you have one). Turns out there's really only one firm with a feed I've found. You can look up the guidance in the press release from the previous earnings.

In the case of KORS, they've sandbagged by between $100M and $40M the last few quarters. Will this last forever as their growth slows, no. Will they sandbag big again this ! quarter? ! You bet they will. How much is up to speculation, but again, it's just understanding what the trends in this are that give us more confidence that they are going to beat the sell side estimates. Remember that the sell side often just goes with the company's guidance. This is a large piece of their bias, use it to your advantage.

4. Other margin assumptions are important and you can add value here. Did food prices rise for that restaurant? What did the price of oil do throughout the quarter for that energy company? How much did Netflix (NFLX) spend on content this quarter? These are all things that you can make decent assumptions for to add value. Obviously this factors into your EPS estimate. Do you need to know exactly what the net income is and the number of shares, no, you can eyeball it based on everything else. Remember the sell side will almost always be too conservative here.

Regarding KORS, did they have to discount merchandise or were they able to hold prices steady given demand and the value of their brand? I would say the margins should be fine, I don't see any of this changing this quarter.

5. Use your general knowledge of the company and its industry. I've been super accurate at forecasting WholeFoods because I eat there, A LOT. I've seen their business transform from grocery store to the Starbucks (SBUX) of prepared food. There are huge margin shifts inherent in that transition. Is everyone around you buying an iPad? Well when that thing came out I saw everyone on the subway buy one, immediately. That was a pretty good indicator. These are incremental things that will move your estimates up or down.

How well is the industry doing as a whole? 3D printing is a surging industry right now, so when we are forecasting out 2-4 quarters into the future you would expect that revenue growth is gonna be pretty strong, there's no reason to believe it's going to collapse like the number of devices that BlackBerry (BBRY) is selling. A rising tide lifts all boats.

6. Ho! w did oth! er companies in that industry report recently? These things are often pretty connected. Sometimes it's a zero sum game, as with Coach (COH) and Kors, but a lot of the time it's not. This is going to be a good quarter for all of the home builders, they didn't eat each other's lunch, they all killed it. Use the previous reports from other companies as a proxy for where expectations are and where the companies came in, it's usually a pretty good guide.

Estimize has sector and industry pages so that you can check all of the stocks in one industry by report date. Here's consumer apparel:

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7. Take a look at where the Estimize consensus numbers are relative to the sell side and the actual results historically. The Estimize consensus is more accurate than the sell side about 70% of the time historically. There's no shame at all in using this information, look at the delta in the numbers for the current quarter, use that info to your advantage.

8. Take a look at where the very accurate Estimize analysts are with their estimates. This is why we have the scatterplot chart, so that you can see who the outliers are, and if one or more of them has historically been very accurate for that stock or industry, you're going to want to take that into heavy consideration when making your own estimate. This was the KORS scatter from last quarter.

(click to enlarge)

9. The last thing I look at is how the stock has performed over the course of the quarter, and how it sets up technically into the report. As fundamental expectations are a major driver of supply and demand for a stock, you can expect that if analysts are taking their estimates down all quarter, there's a good chance the stock is gonna get smacked. Likewise, if owners of th! e stock a! re selling en mass, you can expect that there's probably something wrong going on fundamentally. This isn't always the case, but more often than not it is. Use the price action as a judge for where to expect the numbers, the buy side buys stocks faster than the sell side moves their estimates.

This doesn't always give you an accurate picture of where the company will report, but it will give you insight into what the expectations are and how much of those expectations are baked into price already. Google (GOOG) just had a hugely disappointing quarter, estimates were real high, and they blew it.

Put all of this information together and you've got your estimate. Again, this stuff isn't rocket science. The media likes to make this whole thing sound really complicated, it's not. I've been a buy side analyst, we traded tens of millions of dollars worth of stock on a daily basis, we never had any earnings models in Excel. Let others do the 80% leg work for you, then add the last 20% intelligently, because that's where the real money is made. It's not made in doing the calculation from net income to EPS, it's made in having a good view that the company you're looking at is going to grow revenue faster over the next 4 quarters than the rest of the market thinks, and being able to understand how the market may revalue its multiple because of that. This is the true value of an analyst, it's not in crunching numbers, any fool can do that given a month of training at an investment bank.

Storing your estimates inside of the Estimize platform can be a valuable process given the alerts and notifications that it produces. This dramatically cuts down on the time it takes to do the 9 things I just laid out above, and you can incorporate that information in real time as things move.

If you have any other questions please feel free to post them below, or get in touch with me directly.

Disclosure: Nothing on this site should ever be considered to be advice, research or an invitation to buy! or sell ! any securities, please see the Disclaimer page for a full disclaimer.

Source: How To Make Earnings Estimates For Non Pro Analysts

Will Trina Solar Finally Shine?

On Wednesday, Trina Solar (NYSE: TSL  ) will release its latest quarterly results. Given all the issues that have plagued the solar industry lately, can the company get past its lack of profitability to survive the shakeout among Chinese solar companies?

Recently, Chinese solar stocks have been extremely volatile, as a glut of supply and weak pricing conditions have finally started to cause debt defaults and other financial challenges among the industry's weaker players. The question Trina and its rivals face is how to survive long enough to reap the benefits of a potential rebound in the industry in the future. Let's take an early look at what's been happening with Trina Solar over the past quarter and what we're likely to see in its quarterly report.

Stats on Trina Solar

Analyst EPS Estimate	($0.72)
Year-Ago EPS	($0.42)
Revenue Estimate	$292.77 million
Change From Year-Ago Revenue	(16.3%)
Earnings Beats in Past 4 Quarters	0

Source: Yahoo! Finance.

Will Trina light up its earnings this quarter?
So far, analysts' optimism about Trina in recent months has been limited to the long-term outlook. Although they've narrowed their loss estimates for the full 2013 and 2014 years, they've widened their expected losses for the March quarter by $0.06 per share. Yet the stock has soared in anticipation of better times ahead, gaining more than 50% since the end of February.

Most of the move in Trina's stock has come in just the past month, as two trends have really taken hold since April. First, U.S. companies First Solar (NASDAQ: FSLR  ) and SunPower (NASDAQ: SPWR  ) have given rosy projections of their respective future prospects, as First Solar aims to improve its panels' efficiency through its acquisition of TetraSun, and SunPower has benefited from its industry-leading efficiency in boosting its profits. In addition, with the bond default earlier this year by Suntech Power (NYSE: STP  ) , some believe that the Chinese government might allow weaker Chinese players to fail, which could potentially lead to reduced production and end what has been a crippling supply glut that has weighed on prices around the world.

But Trina gave a troubling update to its quarterly guidance a couple weeks ago, saying that it shipped 390-400 megawatts of solar modules during the quarter, down from its original 420-430 megawatt estimate. With gross margins of just 1% to 3%, Trina isn't faring as badly as peer ReneSola (NYSE: SOL  ) , which posted negative gross margins in its quarterly report earlier this month. Yet Trina still isn't making enough money to come close to profitability in the near future.

Another big obstacle to Trina and its Chinese peers has come from trade restrictions. With Europe seen potentially joining the U.S. in imposing tariffs on Chinese imports, there's a real possibility that Trina will get priced out of one of its most important markets.

As informative as Trina's quarterly report will be in providing another view on the Chinese solar industry, investors should focus on the far more important question of what happens in Europe and how to affects various Chinese companies with a big presence in that market. Until the shakeout in China runs its course, Trina investors should expect to see plenty of volatility in share prices for the foreseeable future.

Investors and bystanders alike were shocked by First Solar's precipitous drop in 2011. But lately, the stock has rebounded sharply, and the stakes have never been higher for the company: can it continue to rebound? If you're looking for continuing updates and guidance on the company whenever news breaks, The Motley Fool has created a brand-new report that details every must know side of this stock. To get started, simply click here now.

Click here to add Trina Solar to My Watchlist, which can find all of our Foolish analysis on it and all your other stocks.

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More Expert Advice from The Motley Fool

The Motley Fool's chief investment officer has selected his No. 1 stock for the next year. Find out which stock in our brand-new free report: "The Motley Fool's Top Stock for 2013." I invite you to take a copy, free for a limited time. Just click here to access the report and find out the name of this under-the-radar company.

Why Marin Software Shares Got Clobbered

Although we don't believe in timing the market or panicking over market movements, we do like to keep an eye on big changes -- just in case they're material to our investing thesis.

What: Shares of Marin Software (NYSE: MRIN  ) got clobbered today, down by as much as 21% after the company reported earnings.

So what: Revenue in the first quarter totaled $17.2 million, which resulted in a non-GAAP net loss of $9.4 million, or $0.39 per share. The freshly public software maker saw gross margin decline to 57%, and its losses grew from a year ago. Investors obviously wanted more.

Now what: CEO Chris Lien said that Marin's integrated platform for advertisers will help it tap it digital advertising industry, and that the money raised through the IPO will provide it financial flexibility. Guidance calls for second-quarter sales of $17.6 million to $18 million. Full-year revenue is expected in the range of $75 million to $76.2 million, which will result in adjusted losses of $1.16 to $1.19 per share this year.

Interested in more info on Marin Software? Add it to your watchlist by clicking here.

It's incredible to think just how much of our digital and technological lives are almost entirely shaped and molded by just a handful of companies. Find out "Who Will Win the War Between the 5 Biggest Tech Stocks?" in The Motley Fool's latest free report, which details the knock-down, drag-out battle being waged by the five kings of tech. Click here to keep reading.

Microsoft Is Getting Rich on Android

Investors have long suspected that Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT  ) generates more revenue from Google (NASDAQ: GOOG  ) Android than it does selling Windows Phone licenses. Now they have more evidence to back up this hypothesis.

Within the software giant's earnings release last night, the company reported that its entertainment and devices division grew revenue by $134 million, or 8%, primarily due to Windows Phone revenue. However, when Microsoft says "Windows Phone revenue," it's including its patent licensing revenue that it gets from Android OEMs. Specifically, Microsoft said this type of revenue increased by $222 million.

Most of that has to be coming from Android.

Stay with me
Microsoft's Windows Phone license fee has been estimated between $20 and $30, based on information that a ZTE exec once inadvertently disclosed. Larger OEMs inevitably get volume breaks, and let's say that on average Microsoft gets close to $23 per unit.

IDC estimated that there were 5.4 million Windows Phones sold in Q2 2012. The market researchers have yet to release their estimates on Q2 2013, but investors already know that Nokia (NYSE: NOK  ) is the predominant vendor of Microsoft's platform. Over the past four quarters, Nokia's Lumia has comprised between 73% and 81% of global Windows Phone sales.

The company just disclosed that it sold 7.4 million Lumias in the second quarter. If Nokia represents 75% of all Windows Phones, that implies that there were approximately 9.9 million Windows Phones total. That's a year-over-year increase of 4.5 million units.

At an estimated $23 license fee per unit, that would be an increase of $103.5 million in revenue just for Windows Phone licenses. The remaining $118.5 million of that increase would be Android licensing revenue -- or more than the increase in direct Windows Phone license revenue.

Windows Phone has been gaining momentum lately in the smartphone market, but not that much momentum. Meanwhile, Android has continued its rise. In Q2 2012, there were roughly 105 million Android units shipped, which grabbed 68% of the market. By Q1 2013, that figure had risen to 162.1 million, or 75% market share.

Details surrounding Microsoft's licensing agreement with Android OEMs aren't publicly available, but investors do know that all the biggest vendors have inked deals with the software giant. That includes Samsung, HTC, ZTE, and LG, among many others. In total, Microsoft has about 20 Android OEMs sending it checks for use of Google's operating system, and those are adding up.

It's incredible to think just how much of our digital and technological lives are almost entirely shaped and molded by just a handful of companies like Microsoft and Google. Find out "Who Will Win the War Between the 5 Biggest Tech Stocks?" in The Motley Fool's latest free report, which details the knock-down, drag-out battle being waged by the five kings of tech. Click here to keep reading.

Allstate Sells Lincoln Benefit Life Unit

In a continuing effort to "reduce its exposure to spread-based business," Allstate (NYSE: ALL  ) has entered into a definitive agreement to sell its Lincoln Benefit Life (LBL) business to Resolution Life, a subsidiary of U.K.-based The Resolution Group, for $600 million, Allstate announced.

The deal will further Allstate's objective of exiting the independent agency segment of the market, and is also in line with plans to discontinue issuing fixed annuity (spread-based) business by year-end 2013, according to the company.

The sale of LBL, according to chairman, president, and CEO Thomas Wilson, will "sharpen Allstate Financial's focus on the Allstate agency channel while still providing a broad suite of products for our customers."

Including tax benefits, Allstate expects to generate cash proceeds of an estimated $785 million from the transaction. The sale of LBL will also lower Allstate's required capital requirements by about $1 billion, the company said. A GAAP loss on sale of an estimated $475 million to $525 million, and a decline in GAAP equity between $575 million and $675 million, are expected.

The transaction will likely close by  year end, and is subject to customary closing conditions.

Learning from 1970s Investment Advice

The Not-So-Dirty Secret Behind Warren Buffet's Recent Buy

Back in late May, MidAmerican Energy, a subsidiary of Warren Buffet's Berkshire Hathaway (NYSE: BRK-B  ) , made a $5.59 billion offer to buy NV Energy (NYSE: NVE  ) . On the surface, this seems like the prototypical Warren Buffett kind of acquisition. If you dig deeper, though, there is one lesser known area that could make this purchase an even bigger win. Let's take a look at the move and what small element could make this a big win for the Oracle of Omaha.

For Berkshire, boring is beautiful
It can be really hard to get excited about regulated utilities. An industry that has its profit levels regulated by the state doesn't exactly get the heart racing. But these boring, mostly overlooked businesses are right in Warren Buffett's wheelhouse. It's hard to find a larger economic moat than a state-regulated monopoly like NV Energy, which delivers power to 88% of Nevada's population, including those living in America's ode to electricity, Las Vegas. 

From a pure numbers standpoint, the acquisition of NV Energy will give the Buffett portfolio about a 25% boost in income to its energy and utility sector. The move will also help to create a much larger exposure to natural gas than in Berkshire's current holdings. Currently, Buffett's utilities generate about 48% of its power from coal and 22% from natural gas. If the NV deal were to go through, it would then generate 42% from coal and 37% from natural gas. This could prove very advantageous if increased regulations on carbon emissions were to pop up in the utility sector in the coming years. 

Considering these factors alone, the purchase of NV Energy seems to make pretty good sense. It provides another stable income source, it adds a market that was not previously in the Berkshire holdings, and provides a more balanced generation capacity portfolio. But is that enough to pay a 20% premium on the company's share price when the deal was announced? Possibly not, but there are a couple hidden aspects of NV Energy that could certainly make that purchase price worth its while.

Going for the bigger fish
The biggest upside for the NV Energy lies not in its current customers or its generation capacity, but in the other market that it could serve: California. The Golden State is the nation's second-largest electricity market. In 2011, the state consumed 261 million MW-hours, 7% of the nation's total. To meet that massive need, the state needs to import about 25% of its energy from outside the state. This issue has been compounded even further since Edison Intenational (NYSE: EIX  ) shut down the SONGS nuclear facility early last year. Total imports of electricity for California are nearly double the entire Nevada electricity market.

 

Source: U.S. Energy Information Administration

What also makes the California situation so intriguing is the state's initiatives to reduce carbon emissions. Even though the state only imports 25% of its electricity needs, those imports represent 50% of the states carbon emissions for electricity generation. So not only does the state look to import massive amounts of electricity, but it also wants to import cleaner sources.

This is where Nevada -- and more specifically NV Energy -- comes into play. Nevada is well positioned to service the California market with alternative energy because of location and the favorable environment for both solar and geothermal energy. While the company may not have large amounts of alternative energy in its current portfolio, there are over 1,000 MW of alternative energy under construction. Also, other companies in the the state combine to have plans to bring on over 5,400 MW of solar power on board in the next several years.

But for all that to be put into use, it will need to go though NV's transmission system, which owns most of the connections between Nevada and California. So the company is in the process of constructing the ON line transmission project, a 500-MW transmission line that will connect the major generation facilities across the state with the trans-border connections near Las Vegas. With wholesale prices for electricity in Southern California reaching $50 per MW-hour, these transmission lines could score a major win for Nevada energy producers, NV Energy, and now Berkshire Hathaway.

What a Fool believes 
This isn't the only time a Berkshire purchase unearthed major upside in the energy markets. With the boom in Bakken crude production, Burlington Northern Santa Fe has become a major transportation option for refiners on both the East Coast and West Coast. The company, in a dual-line partnership with CSX (NYSE: CSX  ) , is moving 300,000 barrels of oil per day to Albany, N.Y., for transport to refineries in Canada and the U.S. With costs for moving oil to the East Coast in the neighborhood of $13-$15 a barrel, these shipments alone represent $4 million a day in revenue that did not exist only a year ago. Buffett has been doing this for a long time, but he still seems to be a couple steps ahead of the rest of us.

But that's not all Buffett has been investing in regarding the energy space. In the past quarter alone, Berkshire has increased his holdings by over 40% in this behind-the-scenes energy giant that is poised to profit for years to come. Learn more about what great long-term investors like Warren Buffet see in this company. We at The Motley Fool have put together a special free report called "The Only Energy Stock You'll Ever Need" to help you understand this company and make great investment decisions like Mr. Buffett. Click here to access your report -- it's totally free.

Coca-Cola Goes Flat

The following video is from Tuesday's Investor Beat, in which host Chris Hill, and analysts Jason Moser and Isaac Pino, dissect the hardest-hitting investing stories of the day.

Coca-Cola's (NYSE: KO  ) latest earnings disappointed Wall Street, as volume growth was downright anemic. With the long-term trend of soda consumption in the United States on the decline, Big Red generates the majority of its revenue overseas. Surprisingly, Coca-Cola's executives blamed the poor results on bad weather. In our lead story on Investor Beat, Motley Fool analysts Jason Moser and Isaac Pino discuss whether Pepsi will suffer the same challenge of bad weather, and if the dip in Coca-Cola's stock price represents a buying opportunity for investors.

If you're looking for some long-term investing ideas, you're invited to check out The Motley Fool's brand-new special report, "The 3 Dow Stocks Dividend Investors Need." It's absolutely free, so simply click here now and get your copy today.

Can Intuitive Surgical Earnings Overcome Its Controversy?

Intuitive Surgical (NASDAQ: ISRG  ) will release its quarterly report on Thursday, but don't expect shareholders to be too excited about the report. Shares of the company recently traded at their lowest levels in nearly two years, and with ongoing controversy about the company's da Vinci robotic surgical systems, it's unclear whether Intuitive Surgical earnings can hold up to the pressure the stock is under right now.

Intuitive Surgical was once the darling of the stock market, as its innovative machines helped take robotic surgery out of the realm of science fiction to become much more widely accepted. Now, though, the systems have been around long enough to invite critiques from medical professionals and patients alike, with some questioning whether the devices' effectiveness justifies their cost. Let's take an early look at what's been happening with Intuitive Surgical over the past quarter and what we're likely to see in its quarterly report.

Stats on Intuitive Surgical

Analyst EPS Estimate	$4.04
Change From Year-Ago EPS	7.7%
Revenue Estimate	$594.58 million
Change From Year-Ago Revenue	10.8%
Earnings Beats in Past 4 Quarters	4

Source: Yahoo! Finance.

What'll drive Intuitive Surgical earnings this quarter?
Over the past few months, analysts have ramped down their views on where Intuitive Surgical earnings will land. They've cut their June-quarter estimates by more than $0.30 per share, making similar cuts to full-year 2013 expectations and cutting their 2014 views by double that amount. The stock has plunged recently, falling 17% since early April.

Most of those losses have come in the past week, as Intuitive Surgical issued some preliminary results from the second quarter. In the early report, the company said that it expected net income of $160 million on sales of $575 million, with both figures being roughly 10% below what analysts had previously expected. The company cited hospitals holding off on purchases, weakness in hospital admissions numbers, and conservative decisions from health insurance companies as weighing on its results, even though it reported an 18% jump in the number of surgical procedures performed. MAKO Surgical (NASDAQ: MAKO  ) has also pulled back on the news, as investors fear that the same trends will affect its results adversely as well -- with potentially greater ramifications, given that, unlike Intuitive, MAKO isn't profitable.

Much of the attention on Intuitive Surgical lately has focused on comments from regulators and medical professionals about the devices. Earlier this year, the FDA announced an investigation into the company, and even though its findings weren't particularly problematic, it nevertheless brought Intuitive Surgical's name into the limelight in a negative way. Moreover, some medical professionals have questioned whether robotic surgery has benefits for hysterectomy patients over more traditional methods of performing the procedure.

But it's the second-order effects of that attention that seem to be having the biggest impact on Intuitive Surgical earnings. As medical facilities and health-insurance companies both start having to deal with the full ramifications of the implementation of Obamacare, they have to deal with uncertainty about how much of their costs they'll be able to recoup under the new health-care law. That's likely one of the driving forces behind the "conservative decisions" about treatment options, and combined with the 2.3% medical-device excise tax, Intuitive Surgical could continue to see headwinds until Obamacare becomes less of a wild card and more of a known factor.

In Intuitive Surgical's earnings report, watch for further color on the comments it already made in its preliminary release. Without decisive action, the company could find its stock stuck at these lower levels for some time.

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Click here to add Intuitive Surgical to My Watchlist, which can find all of our Foolish analysis on it and all your other stocks.