3 Stocks Hitting Low Notes

When a stock hits a fresh low, it can either signal a dirt cheap dream stock or a dreadful stock to avoid. Separating the wheat from the chaff is difficult, but finding well-run companies at bargain-basement prices is a great way to accumulate a fortune over the long run.

With that in mind, we'll use the aggregate intelligence of the 110,000-plus investors participating in Motley Fool CAPS to see what the community is saying about stocks hitting 52-week lows today. The community's approval (signified by four- and five-star ratings) could indicate that further research is in order.

Here are three such stocks:

Company	Today’s Low	Industry	CAPS Rating (out of 5)	Fools Saying Outperform
AuthenTec (Nasdaq: AUTH  )	$8.65	Electronics	*****	175 of 179
Cresud (Nasdaq: CRESY  )	$13.00	Food and beverage	*****	346 of 357
Kinetic Concepts (NYSE: KCI  )	$35.34	Health services	*****	313 of 331

Source: Motley Fool CAPS, as of July 29, 2008.

Five-star electronics companies:

• ON Semiconductor (Nasdaq: ONNN  ) : Stock price is 17.9% cheaper than last year.
• Lam Research (Nasdaq: LRCX  ) : Stock price is 46% cheaper than last year.

Five-star health services companies:

• Hologic (Nasdaq: HOLX  ) : Stock price is 13% cheaper than last year.
• Quest Diagnostics (NYSE: DGX  ) : Stock price is 3.4% cheaper than last year.

Join us on CAPS to learn more about these and countless other interesting stock ideas.