"With the markets increasing volatility it is never a bad time to put a solid financial stock in your portfolio to lower your beta"

Dow Jones Industrial Average 12,376.72 (UP) Week ending 04-01-2011

It may be time to cash in one of those highly volatile tech names that you own that have run up a bit and put a little balance back into your portfolio with a solid bank and financial service name. PNC Financial Services Group Inc. (Symbol PNC, $63.72) a bank that caters to business could be a good place to start. PNC is projecting 2011 earnings of $5.63 per share and for 2012,  $6.38 per share so it trades at a very reasonable PE ratio. PNC has had a very nice 5 year sales growth rate of 18.12 % and a Net profit margin of 19.50%. Not much of a dividend here, but a bank of large enough size to be a possible acquisition candidate.

REPUBLIC BANCORP A (Symbol RBCAA, $19.99) trades at a remarkably low PE of 5.  This  Louisville, KY bank has a decent dividend yield of 2.85%. Republic has Net profit margins of 23.8%
and a Book value of $17.72 per share so it is a great value here. It has a Beta volatility rating of 0.97 so it will not rock the boat of your moving portfolio value. It also has a steady 5 year sales growth rate of 8.81% , which is not to bad for a bank.



J.Pierpont Morgan


I would be remiss if I did not mention here, for a conversation on stability and low beta , the bank founded by John Pierpont Morgan the lender of last resort to railroads, banks, and governments. A one man "federal reserve" , they said to look into his eyes was like looking into the headlights of an oncoming freight train.

JPMorgan Chase & Co. (Symbol JPM, $46.35) has a low PE of 9.7 . Book value on this stock is $44.28 per share and it has a low beta volatility 1.15 so you can sleep at night here with this one. Earnings for 2011 are projected at $4.78 per share and for 2012 , $5.61 per share. They have on their balance sheet 2.18 Trillion dollars in assets, (and big liabilities to go with them), and 930 Billion in deposits. (Maybe they should keep our Social Security payments from our paychecks here so it doesn't get spent!).

I would also like to include a savings and loan financial institution in the small cap category. New York Community Bancorp Inc. (Symbol NYB,  $17.37 ) offers a  5.76% dividend yield. NYB has a Beta volatility ratio of 0.75, operates at Net profit margins of 24%, and has a five year sales growth of 10.24%. The stock has not moved much, (Total return 12 month, 11.5%) because the dividend is an 80% payout ratio. but you will certainly hold on to your principle.

Remember what Will Rogers said , " The quickest way to double your money is to fold it and put it back in your pocket."

So reign in the volatility a little bit on your high beta portfolio and plug in one of these names in your list of diversified stocks.



         Freewilly  

"Blog #83 "The Rainmaker". Alcatel-Lucent, Freescale Semiconductor, and Hewlett Packard collaborate to hit a Gran-Slam with lightRadio Cube & portfolio. A scalable,green, combo tower & cloud backend solution to handle the Smartphone Tsunami** "

Dow Jones Industrial Average 12,200.59  (UP) Week ending 03-25-2011

We have been blessed here in Philadelphia with a long history of home run hitters. Ryan Howard, Michael Schmidt, Greg "the Bull" Luzinski, Dick "Richie"Allen, Cy Williams, Chuck Klein and Del Ennis going back.

  Well ...  Alcatel-Lucent ADR (Symbol ALU, $5.34), Freescale Semiconductor (owned by Blackstone Group, Symbol BX, $18.74), and Hewlett Packard (Symbol HPQ, $42.53) have gotten together and hit an IBM tape measure shot Grandslam of Epic proportion. A Rainmaker. One Harry Kalas would say "That ball is out of here!". (Happy Birthday Harry today).  We are talking here like the Roy Hobbs moon shot in the movie "The Natural" that hits off of the top of the light tower and explodes it into showers of streaming light. Are we starting to get the picture here?

Roy Hobbs


lightRadio Cube is a game changer. Everything that exist now for this functionality is suddenly now 10-fold obsolete. Ancient history. Wim Sweldens - the President of the Wireless Division of Alcatel-Lucent  in the press conference on this portfolio from Bell Labs compares it to the "Invention of the transistor".  What is it?  I will need to quote Alcatel Lucent for that:
 
 

 
"lightRadio is a flexible architecture that distributes intelligence throughout the network so that it can dynamically expand to meet growing demands.


lightRadio Cube

 This is accomplished by creating a new architecture where the base station, typically located at the base of each cell tower, is broken into its component elements and distributed through the network or ‘carrier cloud.’ Additionally the various cell tower antennas are combined and shrunk into a single powerful, Bell Labs-pioneered multi frequency, multi standard (2G, 3G, LTE) device that can be mounted on poles, sides of buildings or anywhere else there is power and a broadband connection.

Leveraging Bell Labs innovations in active antenna technology and advanced CPRI compression and partnerships with Freescale and HP, Alcatel-Lucent is first in the industry to announce products in this space.

The lightRadio product family is comprised of the Wideband Active Array Antenna, the Multiband Remote Radio Head, the lightRadio Baseband Processing, the lightRadio Control, and end-to-end management using the 5620 Service Aware Manager (SAM). The product family depends on a number of breakthrough innovations and technologies from Alcatel-Lucent’s Bell Labs research arm and ecosystem of companies."

Here's the skinny on it. Alcatel Lucent has over 200 patents on the portfolio of lightRadio products that they are going to release every six months out into 2014. Freescale Semiconductor has put all the electronics that used to be in a cell tower into a chipset that fits into a cube that  can sit in palm of your hand. The cubes can be put anywhere there is power and a connection.

They can increase the current capacity on a tower by 30 X times.

Oh, and did I forget to mention that   lightRadio reduces energy consumption of mobile networks by up to 50% over current radio access network equipment.

Hewlett Packard is doing all the back end "cloud" work for this partnership. No small task.

The partnership has garnered acceptance from Verizon Wireless, Orange, and China Mobile to uptake this technology. I recommend that
you sign up and watch the press conference. Here is a link.  lightRadio Press conference , green box on right side

This is the advent of a modern day transportation system comparable to Vanderbilt's New York Central Railroad or that  Philadelphia institution the Pennsylvania Railroad. But instead of moving people and freight they are moving information, data, voice, and streaming video all over the world. The greatest railroad of all-time.

I recommend that you accumulate all three of these stocks, (ALU, BX, and HPQ) as a solid 5 year investment.

Freewilly   

** Credit CNBC's Jim Cramer with coining of the term "Smartphone Tsunami"

"Cisco declares a dividend, usually a sign with a large cap tech stock that high growth has ended . So where is the growth in their sector?

Dow Jones Industrial Average 11,859 (Down) Week ending 03-19-2011 

Cisco Systems Inc. (Symbol CSCO, $17.14) has been growing for years by buying 5 to 6 small companies a year to add to their core competency's and maintain growth. The company's 5 year growth rate is 7.93 % . But currently with annual revenues of 42 billion dollars it is very hard to have any growth impact without a major acquisition. It appears now, with the stock down 34.2% for 12 months, that John Chambers and the Cisco board does not currently see a business that fits in with their long-term strategy goals so they have decided to declare a dividend instead. They have 40 billion in cash and short term investments so it is not like they couldn't do it at any time if they wanted to. Unfortunately, when other large techs like Microsoft and Intel have done this their stocks they have sat dead in the water for years. So I would say to avoid this stock for the time being.



Shogi

The terrible events that took place in Japan are definitely going to cause supply interruptions in electronics and other industrial parts. Wafer manufacturing, Flash memory, Electronic epoxies and automotive electronic parts will all be affected. Brilliant new century idea: STOCK SOME FRIGGIN INVENTORY AT YOUR COMPANY AND IN THE SUPPLY CHAIN! Then when we have supply interruptions and you embarrassingly have to report it to wall street and you have to explain to your management why your company stock took an 8 point hit, you will tell them that it is actually not a problem. The Japanese are a resilient people and they should get this stuff back on line quickly with help. I admire their spirit and determination. Then we can get back to Shogi.

So if Cisco is not going to get it done for you, where should you look for growth?  Just a note here and I have witnesses. I start saving my logos for my blog on Thursday in preparation for writing it. So when I went to WAWA to get some dollar change for the car wash that my car desperately needed and pick up a $3.00 copy of Investors Business Daily, I was surprised and a little disturbed that IDB had Riverbed Technology Inc. (Symbol RVBD, $37.52) not only ranked, but ranked NUMBER #ONE on their Top100 list for 03/21/2011. Riverbed is where I am going to lead you to for growth in this sector. 5 year sales growth of 80.50% and projected long term earnings growth of 27.6% make Riverbed the best choice in this sector.

My suggestion though is that Tech stocks will be under pressure this week, as these supply shortages start popping up, and that you look to buy this stock on a little bit of a pullback as the other tech stocks get beat up.  If it does not go down, then feel free to buy it at this price at the end of the week and hold it for a one to three year investment.

 Everyone should continue to support Japan both financially and with prayers. Even after the nuclear issues have been resolved, the country still has sustained tremendous damage and will need allot of assistance.  

Japanese Proverb:

“Fall seven times and stand up eight.”

 Freewilly

"Some Small Cap names for MARCH with catalyst or dynamics for rapid growth. EBIX,THC,CPHD,TZOO,CYH"

Dow Jones Industrial Average 12044.40  (down) Week ending 03-11-2011

 March Comes in Like a Lion, Sangatsu no Raion, lit. March Lion; alternatively called Sangatsu no Lion or 3gatsu no Lion; officially translated as March Comes in Like a Lion. This ironically is the name of a  Japanese TV series set in Tokyo, Japan following the everyday life of a 17-year old Shogi player. Japan has had a roaring March so far, with earthquakes, a 33 foot tsunami washing whole cities away, and now up to 6 of its Nuclear plants affected by these tragic events. All the people and countries of the world need to come to their assistance.

Our US stock markets have been weathering their own storm in March. But alas, spring will arrive here with the Crocuses poking their colorful heads up in white, purple and yellow. The Red winged black birds have arrived at the bird feeder so the green of springtime cannot be far behind. 

So a look at some small cap stocks with budding growth. EPIX Inc. (Symbol EBIX, $28.13) provides a series of application software products for the insurance industry ranging from carrier systems, agency systems and exchanges to custom software development for carriers, brokers, and agents involved in the insurance industry. They have been compared by some analysts to Salesforce.com (CRM). They are buying up companies an expanding quickly.

Tenet Healthcare Corp. (symbol THC, $7.09) has a recent Return on equity of 124.3% . Allot of that was due to a million dollar tax credit on the balance sheet but EBITA is improving at this center city health care provider. When ObamaCare kicks in they should get paid for allot of services that they now give away for free at the emergency room. Earnings per share for 2012 projected at $0.44 cents.

St. Patricks Day this week on March 17th. My stock pick for last year on St.Pat's day was Boston Beer Company (Samuel Adams) (Symbol SAM), and was my best pick of the year last year up 68%.
This year how about some TravelZoo (Symbol TZOO, $ 44.98) to put some green in your beer and in your wallet. 2011 earnings per share of $1.09 and for 2012 $1.48 per share.

Also drink to your health with a couple of healthy stock picks.

CEPHEID (Symbol CPHD, $26.18) is a Sunnyvale, CA. company
that is a molecular diagnostics company that develops, manufactures, and markets fully-integrated systems for testing in the Clinical market, as well as for application in the company's legacy Bio threat and Industrial markets. 5 year sales growth of 21.19% and projected earnings growth of 25%. Earnings ramp up in 2012 to $0.48 cents per share. Get in early.

..... and one last one to go with your Black and Tan above would be
Community Health Systems Inc. (Symbol CYH, $39.61) that is in the hospital business and has plenty of earnings. 5 year sales growth of 31.96%. I guess all us oldsters are ending up at the hospital more. Good numbers, but not allot of institutional buyers in this stock.

All these stocks are higher beta volatility than the stocks that I usually put in this venue, so be careful, but you do need some small cap for growth in your portfolio.

So hope for Springtime and pray for the people in Northern Japan that they can put their lives back together.

Best Wishes for a splendid St. Patty's Day,

Freewilly 

"We throw up our hands at the prices at the gas pump. Why not profit by owning some of the top Oil stocks?"

Dow Jones Industrial Average  12,170  (Down) Week ending 03/02/2011

$3.47, $3.54, $3.68 and outrage in Pennsylvania USA at the gas pump. Little do we know that in California, and international markets they have already been above $4.00 and $5.00 a gallon and someone told me in Amsterdam it is $8.00 a gallon.  Shame on you Royal Dutch Shell.   The threat of oil shortages from the turmoil in Africa to the supplies of Italy, France and Spain is causing a premium in the price of Brent Crude and is pulling up the average price of oil worldwide.  So what is a person to do?


How about taking some positions in Oil companies with good fundamentals that will profit from this turmoil. This would give you a hedge on the price rises. PETROLEO BRASILEIRO (Symbol PBR, $41.48) is a oil and gas driller with gigantic revenues that still trades at a current PE of 13. PBR has earnings of $3.45 per share for 2010 and next year 2012, with current oil pricing premium, probably around $3.70 per share. 5 year sales growth in the company is 13.72% and the stock price has not run up on this current oil price rise.


Devon Energy Corp. (Symbol DVN, $91.12) has tremendous numbers for growth and earnings and trades at a PE of 15.37. The 2011 earnings are a healthy $5.92 per share and projected for 2012 of a healthier $7.65 per share. 49.8% Net profit margins and a 42% 12 month total return make this a great anchor stock for a portfolio.
                                                   
Helmerich & Payne Inc. (symbol HP, $63.33) trades at a PE of 16.4. HP also gives you a kicker of owning some commercial real estate.  2011 earnings of $3.92 and 2012 of $4.32 per share. 5 year sales growth of 14.51% and a 12 month Total return of 68.8% makes this a solid fundamental pick for your account. The 3 year total return of 38% and a very strong balance sheet will let you sleep good at night with this stock.


 Two other names I like here and feel confident in are Apache Corp. (symbol APA, $120.97) and Petrohawk Energy Corp. (Symbol HK, $21.80). Both have great growth dynamics and will deliver great results to help you offset your cost of rising gasoline prices.
 

As always,stay diversified and do not load up totally on one stock category. The oil prices will not keep going up but will settle out at a higher level than last time.US government policies towards oil drilling must change or our economy will be stymied. Of course we need all the alternate energy solutions also, including nuclear power.


We do not want to see gasoline signs that look something like this:
 
So ride your bicycle or pay up and drive. Own some of these stocks and hedge your gasoline bill with some capital gains.
 
Freewilly

"Here is a double barrel super charged hemi pair of stocks, General Motors and Ford Motor Company, ready to rock your portfolio"

Dow Jones Industrial Average  12130.45  (Down)  Week ending 02-25-2011

I don't know who lent money to who, or if or when it will be paid back, none of that matters now. Water under the bridge. They pulled a "wall street", and got away with it, so be it. That is the former stockholders problem. The USA needs General Motors.

General Motors (symbol GM , $33.25) now is back with the pedal to the metal. This quarter, 3.7 Billion in earnings and $4,300 dollar bonus checks going to the working employees for productivity. This is the way that it used to work in the good old days. Everyone makes money. Everyone is happy.

Fueled by international sales, GM is projecting earnings in 2011 of $4.20 per share and 2012 earnings of $5.27 per share. There is only 9.6% institutional participation in the stock right now so there are allot of people asleep at the wheel right now who are managing pension funds and mutual funds.You actually need to go to the web page to see how staggeringly well they are doing in sales across all product lines. See GM sales-production . GM is a strong buy here after the oil scare discount applied last week.

Ford Motor Company (Symbol F, $15.07) the other barrel of this double shot pick didn't take any money from the government.If you haven't been paying attention Alan R. Mulally has delivered to stock holders a one year total return of 28.4% and a 3 year total return of 130.8%. The launch of the Ford Focus compact car on a shared platform, or underpinning, around the world allows the car to be made in Asia, Europe and North America using 80 percent common parts and 75 percent of the same supply base. North American sales of cars built from the Focus-sized platform, already expected to rise this year, will skyrocket if oil and gasoline prices spike to more than $4 per gallon as they did in 2008. Here is the full financial picture for Ford:  FORD Investor Overview. A look at the fundamentals shows Ford earnings for 2011 are projected to be $1.89 per share and for 2012 projects at $1.98 per share.  Another strong buy.

Just for the record and correctness I mentioned Hemi in my title which is totally associated with Mopar and Chrysler products. Pictured below is Mickey Thompson's 427 Ford/Hemi Engine - Mickey's Mystery Motor. Yes, It's A Hemi. No, It's Not A Chrysler. It's A Ford. This Rare piece was Created By Mickey Thompson 46 Years Ago. So get off your horse and settle down now.

That engine you could hear and it is a wonderful sound. They could record it and put it in the 2012 electric Ford Focus, that would turn heads!

Freewilly

"Our search for growth takes us to the IT and Managerial services companies, Gartner, Accenture, Syntel, and NCI information services"

Dow Jones Industrial Average 12391.25  (UP) Week Ending 02-18-2011

 The snow is finally melting here in southern Pennsylvania and the winds are rolling in which means Spring is just around the corner. This year 2011 is well underway and I am searching for areas where there is Revenue growth as well as Earnings growth. One area that looks good is the IT and Managerial services sector. No matter what is going on in the economy, data keeps growing at a rapid rate and needs to be managed. The first company I want to look at is Gartner Inc. (Symbol IT, $38.33) who just reported sales and earnings and had a very nice increase in cash flow. Gartner is projecting earnings in 2011 of $1.40 per share and 2012 of $1.76. Long term earnings are growing at 20% per year. One year Total Return on the stock is 61% and 3 year is 102.7 %, not too shabby.


The next information technology company is Syntel , (Symbol SYNT, $54.15) which has a 5 year revenue growth of 17.99%. This NASDAQ stock is projecting 2011 earnings of $2.86 per share and 2012 earnings of $3.31 per share. This stock seems pretty reasonably priced with a PE ratio of 19. Syntel Q4 revenue of $144.9M, is up 23% from year-ago quarter as just reported by GLOBE NEWSWIRE.

Accenture PLC Class A , (Symbol ACN , $53.61) is probably the most well known out of these picks because of their massive ongoing TV advertising campaign. This management service company had impressive revenues of 23.8 Billion last year, which is a big company. Earnings for 2011 are looking like $3.16 per share and 2012 is projected at $3.51 per share. This company boasts a 63.9% Return on Equity (ROE) and the Total 12 month return on the stock is 36.2% and the 3 year total return is 58%. The stock price is up  10.56% so far this year so there is still room for you.


 Now we move from large cap to small cap. Most investors are underweight the small cap sector in their portfolios out of some fear of their volatility. You need to have them in your portfolio because they will add a needed high growth dimension to your portfolio if you diversify with the right ones. I feel that small cap and mid cap stocks should be around 35% of your portfolio. Most professionals  would think that is  too high a percentage. NCI A (Symbol NCIT, $22.16) is one to include in. NCI Information Systems , Inc. has a five year revenue growth rate of 26%. The price earnings ratio on the stock is a very reasonable PE 12. Earnings per share for 2011 are looking like $1.85 per share and for 2012 are $1.99 per share. The stock had had a nice run from October 2006 to June 2009 and then has been in technical chart trouble since then. Long term earnings growth is 15%. For the fourth quarter of 2010, NCI reported record revenue of $171 million compared to $125 million for the fourth quarter of 2009, with a revenue growth rate of approximately 37%, so maybe we have turned a corner here.

I put a portfolio up on http://www.stockpickr.com/ website under the name FREEWILLY'S STOCKPICKER BLOG 2011, so I will add two of these names, ACN and NCIT, there as additions. You can also find a link to this page on the right side column in the Jim Cramer section of my page. It is a great community of ideas there with both pros and regular folk contributing.  Jim has taken what Lou Rukeyser started in investment TV and amplified it to the max. He does a lot of hard work.

Have a good weekend,

Freewilly

"Better look now because Ebay, like a long distance runner, has got its second wind"

Dow Jones Industrial Average   12,273  (UP)  Week ending 02-11-2011

My brother will be miserable after he reads this blog. He has held ebay (Symbol EBAY, $34.50) stock for years and years and finally dumped it in January this year. It appears that the stock went crashing through its upside technical resistance line this week, like Harold Abrahams exploding thorough the tape at the finish line. Harold of course is the  Olympic champion in 1924 in the 100 meters sprint, a feat depicted in the 1981 movie Chariots of Fire.

If comparing ebay to that infamous 1924 British Team of Olympic runners in Paris, then certainly ebay's PayPal franchise is the Eric Liddell of this ebay team. Eric often called the "Flying Scotsman", after the record breaking locomotive, could run really fast. At a certain point in the race Liddell would deploy an unorthodox running style as portrayed in the film. He would put his head back and have his mouth wide open and would burst into a whole new gear, speeding ahead and becoming unbeatable at that point. PayPal is about to go into this new gear of accelerated growth in revenues.

Assistant managing editor, Paul R. La Monica of CNN Money reported that, " Shares hit a more than 3-year high on Thursday. Chief executive officer John Donahoe of ebay boasted to analysts that revenue from PayPal could more than double from last year's totals to as much as $7 billion annually by 2013. If that happens, PayPal's sales could soon eclipse the revenue that eBay's bread-and-butter auction sites generate."

Ebay has lots of other stuff going on right now also. Ebay Motors, Rent.com, Half.com, StubHub, Bill Me Later, Tommmy Hilfiger direct sales, a minority ownership in Skype.


So if you are like me and cannot afford to buy stock in Mastercard (Symbol MA, $253 per share) from my Freewilly's recommended 2011 Top Ten List, this is probably a good way for you to invest in a financial transaction business.

Ebay's numbers look like this according to analysts:

Average earnings estimate per share for 2011 is $1.74 per share and for 2012 is $1.94 per share. The 12 month Total Return has been 49.9%.

Eric Liddell, born in China while his parents were doing missionary work, had worked with the China Inland Mission as a missionary from Scotland after the Olympics. In 1943 he was held by the Japanese who had taken over the mission and he continued his work there. Later, in 1991, a memorial headstone for Eric Liddell, made from Isle of Mull granite and erected by Edinburgh University, was unveiled at the former Mission and Internment camp site in Weifang, China.

A few simple words taken from the Book of Isaiah 40 :31 form the inscription on his memorial:

"They shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run and not be weary."

So add some ebay to your portfolio this week and grab some popcorn and pick up a DVD copy of the movie "Chariots of Fire" to watch, and become a true champion in your financial race.

Freewilly

"David Tepper of APPALOOSA MANAGEMENT LP owns a good chunk of DEAN FOODS, should you jump into the fray and join him? "

Dow Jones Industrial Average 12092.15  (UP) Week Ending  02-04-2011

David Tepper who leads the New Jersey based hedge fund Appaloosa Management LP had a very good 2010 in the stock market .Tepper's Appaloosa Management which manages approximately $13 billion, returned an impressive 132% last year, thanks to timely purchases of financial stocks. David was a head trader on the high yield desk at Goldman Sachs, and left to start his hedge fund investment firm Appaloosa in 1993. He is also a minority owner of the Pittsburgh Steelers.

     Appaloosa Management has started a brand new position in Dean Foods (Symbol DF, $10.35) for 2011 per a 13G statement filed with the SEC. The hedge fund has disclosed a 7.35% ownership stake in DF with 13,396,536 shares due to trading on December 28th, 2010.


According to the Dean Foods website
"Dean Foods is one of the leading food and beverage companies in the United States and a European leader in branded soy foods and beverages. The Company's Fresh Dairy Direct-Morningstar segment is the largest U.S. processor and distributor of milk, creamer, and cultured dairy products. These offerings are marketed under more than 50 local and regional dairy brands, as well as through private labels.

The WhiteWave-Alpro segment produces and sells an array of branded dairy, soy and plant-based beverages and foods. WhiteWave brands, including Silk® soy and almond milk, Horizon Organic® milk and dairy products, International Delight® coffee creamers, and LAND O'LAKES® creamers, are category leaders and consumer favorites. Alpro is the pan-European leader in branded soy food products."

The stock has run into major resistance here at the $10.00 level.  I decided to study up to see if I could discern where milk prices are going in 2011. What I can tell you from my research is that "Milk" is a very complicated business affected by a number of dynamic pricing factors. It is used as a "lost leader" to get people to go to the back of the supermarket which keeps the prices low. Contrasting that is worldwide food inflation in pricing. Some analysts are actually saying that the protest in Egypt is actually due to citizens fed up with their food prices going up.

This is what I think: Dean Foods stock price was $46.95 in March, 2007
and had made a steady descent down to $7.31 in December, 2010. The company annual sales are 12 Billion, the same as they were in 2007. That gives you $65.72 in sales revenue for every $10.40 share of stock and a lot of value. They are big enough that a Kraft Foods (46.5 Billion revenue) or a UNILEVER ADR (42.5 Billion revenue) or even Hershey Foods (5.5 Billion in revenue) might have an interest in getting together with them for a merger. The "Silk" category of beverage should have explosive growth this year and is certainly more profitable business than traditional milk sales.



Dean Foods will have its fourth quarter earnings conference call on February 16th. Wait till then to take action. If the stock goes down after that call, buy it and trade it back up to this current  $10+ price. If the call goes well, and the stock price moves up, it will have broken through this resistance level and should move to the $13 - $16 price level , a nice percentage gain, so buy it. If the stock does nothing, you should do nothing.

I send my best wishes out to all the American Dairy farmers in the US. The dairy farm is a beautiful sight when you ride down the road and go by them. I especially cheer the family dairy farms carrying on their long tradition. I appreciate your hard work and long hours and hope that your business is successful.


So try some International Delight with your coffee and buy some Dean Foods if the right conditions occur.

Freewilly