Bad days. We all have them; some of us deserve them.
Here are five stocks whose naughty ways drew investors' scorn on Thursday:
|
Company
|
Closing Price
|
CAPS Rating
(out of 5)
|
%
Change
|
52-Week
Range
|
|
Flotek Industries (:FTK)
|
$17.86
|
****
|
(29.85%)
|
$11.51-$55.00
|
|
THQ (:THQI)
|
$19.50
|
**
|
(22.31%)
|
$16.36-$36.76
|
|
WellCare Health (NYSE:WCG)
|
$42.25
|
****
|
(17.06%)
|
$20.81-$128.42
|
|
Deluxe (NYSE:DLX)
|
$22.56
|
**
|
(13.83%)
|
$21.09-$44.95
|
|
Alaska Air Group (NYSE:ALK)
|
$22.71
|
**
|
(8.02%)
|
$21.11-$44.50
|
Sources: The Wall Street Journal, Yahoo! Finance, Motley Fool CAPS.
Naughty?
Well, OK, we can't call these stocks naughty. There are days when five-star winners and newsletter recommendations appear here.
But if you're an investor, you'll be in bad company till the day you die. The trick is to limit contact as much as possible. That's why, when our 82,000-person-strong Motley Fool CAPS community of amateur and professional stock pickers speaks with a poor rating, or a negative pitch, I listen. You should too.
Thus, here is today's list of the worst stocks in the world.
Worse
We begin with WellCare Health, which, according to The Wall Street Journal, is on the verge of booting three of its key executives: CEO Todd Farha, chief financial officer Paul Behrens, and general counsel Thaddeus Bereday.
Company officials refused to comment for the Journal story, but it seems the pending departures are linked to a fraud investigation that involves the FBI, the attorney general for the state of Connecticut, and the SEC.
Worser
Next up is Alaska Air Group, which reported a fourth-quarter loss and fiscal 2007 per-share adjusted earnings that were down 33.9% versus the year prior.
Quoting chairman and CEO Bill Ayer from a company statement: "It's frustrating to report a fourth quarter adjusted loss in what has been a solid year relative to other carriers."
"Relative to other carriers"? I suppose that's true. Frontier just reported an awful quarter, and United parent UAL (Nasdaq: UAUA ) isn't exactly flying high. But when everyone's awful, being better than most doesn't speak well for Alaska and its investors.
Worst
But our winner is THQ, which cut guidance and told investors it had cancelled a pair of games it was developing internally. THQ also said it would close a game development studio it had created.
Well that's that, then. Top game publishers often thrive on content created in-house. Think of the Madden series for Electronic Arts (Nasdaq: ERTS ) . If THQ is out of creative juice, its investors are probably out of luck.
THQ and its lack of game gurus ... Thursday's worst stock in the CAPS world.
Do you agree? Disagree? Let us know what you think by signing up for CAPS today. It's 100% free to participate.
I'll be back next time with more stock horror stories.
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