Wall Street's Best Unknown Stocks

When asked for the secret of his success, baseball player Wee Willie Keeler replied, "Hit 'em where they ain't." What worked for Willie at the plate applies equally well in investing. 

Seeking stocks that others ignore, shun, or simply forget gives individual investors like you an edge over the professionals. When Wall Street turns a blind eye, you have a chance to get in before these stocks get discovered -- or rediscovered -- and start taking off. 

Below, we'll check out companies with only a handful of analyst coverage, then pair our list with the opinions of the Motley Fool CAPS community. A stock that garners CAPS' top ratings, but hasn't yet caught analysts' attention, could be your next home run investment. 

Source: Yahoo! Finance; NA = not available.

Remember, without analyst support, you'll have to do your own scouting to see whether these stocks deserve a spot on your portfolio's roster. Don't just buy or sell them based solely on their appearance here. 

A utility player
As European financial instability plays out, look for top gold producers Barrick Gold (NYSE: ABX) and Agnico-Eagle Mines (NYSE: AEM) to cash in on soaring gold prices. With gold topping $1,200 an ounce, junior miners like Golden Star Resources could also surprise when earnings roll around.

With some analysts expecting Fed chairman Ben Bernanke to unleash a tidal wave of paper money despite (or because of) the austerity measures being agreed upon abroad, more investors think there will be no way to hold back gold's rip-snortin' rise. CAPS member Trashyone says Yamana's simply way undervalued at current levels:

Helicopter Ben Bernanke is going to have to drop another huge load of freshly printed US Dollars over the United States to stave off the second leg of the Great Depression of the 21st Century. As such, the USD cannot remain the worlds reserve currency for much longer and gold is going to regain its rightful place as "real money"; and the benchmark for the worlds central bankers crappy fiat. 

Golden Star Resources investors undoubtedly have a similar outlook; 93% of the nearly 800 CAPS members who've rated the junior miner believe it will go on to outperform the broad market averages.

All fun and games
Paging Dr. Pangloss! Chinese online gaming specialist Perfect World's last earnings report showed this wasn't the best of all possible worlds. Active paying customers thinned out by half a million players (or more than 20%), even as the company nonetheless increased average revenue per user by 37%.

Perfect World wasn't the only Asian online game company that found the current landscape full of dungeons and dragons. NetEase.com (Nasdaq: NTES) reported a weaker-than-expected increase in profit, even though it licenses the massively popular World of Warcraft franchise.

After the high profits realized by early entrants into online gaming, the sector has now attracted a much larger field of rivals, including Changyou.com and Shanda Games (Nasdaq: GAME). But CAPS member umps15 thinks Perfect World's business model will allow the company to keep growing from here:

Last time I checked their most popular game had 50 million players. Their "free to play, pay to play more" model seems to be well implemented (i.e. farmville) and it is reflected on the very high profit margin.

Kicking it higher
Want more oil or natural gas? You'll have to drill to get them, and that's where Precision Drilling's business lies.

Without even getting into the Gulf oil disaster, CAPS All-Star Beorn10 thinks politics and rising oil prices will help contract driller Precision Drilling Trust become a more valuable player:

The political climate in the US will help make oil more expensive, which would stimulate demand for companies like [Precision]. So in the next few months the stock price may be fairly flat, but by December I would expect that [Precision] starts moving significantly higher and pull away from the S&P500.

Swing for the fences
When you're seeking investments where no one else is looking, Motley Fool CAPS is the best place to start your own research. Read a company's financial reports, scrutinize key data and charts, and examine the comments your fellow investors have made, all from a stock's CAPS page. 

Sign up today for the completely free service, and tell us whether these hidden stock opportunities will help us go one up on Wall Street.