People watch stocks for different reasons -- they're waiting for a dip in price, watching for a specific catalyst, gathering all the news and information that might affect stocks they already own, or considering a sell. Regardless of their motivation, we can better understand market sentiment by seeing who's watching what. With the Fool's free My Watchlist service, we have tens of thousands of people telling us the businesses that have, for whatever reason, piqued their interest.

The most-watched utilities stock is ...
Looking at the aggregate data, we see that Exelon (NYSE: EXC) is above the rest in terms of watch interest, the percentage of people keeping an eye on utilities stocks in general who are specifically watching each company. And for good reason.

Exelon is cheap, trading at only 10 times earnings and yielding a fat 5.2%. While some analysts don't like that over half of Exelon's revenue comes from its wholesale power business, the company has a huge advantage over other providers with its fleet of nuclear power plants that produce electricity at very low costs.

Here are the top 15 most-watched companies in the industry with their watch interest along with the stocks' CAPS rating to show the sentiment of our investing community.

 

Company

Market Cap (millions)

CAPS Rating
(out of 5)

Watch Interest

1

Exelon

$26,494

*****

17.3%

2

ITC Holdings (NYSE: ITC)

$3,381

****

12.7%

3

Southern

$30,736

****

12.1%

4

Duke Energy (NYSE: DUK)

$23,467

****

10.5%

5

Brookfield Infrastructure Partners L.P. (NYSE: BIP)

$3,490

*****

6.2%

6

NextEra Energy

$22,209

*****

5.6%

7

Otter Tail (Nasdaq: OTTR)

$779

*****

4.4%

8

American Electric Power

$16,266

***

3.5%

9

FirstEnergy (NYSE: FE)

$2,300

****

3.3%

10

DPL

$3,120

***

2.8%

11

Progress Energy

$12,986

****

2.6%

12

PPL (NYSE: PPL)

$11,911

*****

2.5%

13

Pepco

$4,067

****

2.5%

14

Entergy

$11,752

****

2.5%

15

Hawaiian Electric Industries

$2,231

***

1.3%

Source: Motley Fool, Motley Fool CAPS.

Whether you're keeping an eye on the industry stalwarts like Exelon or are watching an up-and-comer like Otter Tail, it pays to watch. We can help you keep tabs on your companies with My Watchlist, our free, personalized stock tracking service. Click here to start now.