"The bigger they are, the harder they fall." This old saying sums up the worst nightmare of every homeowner, every gold buyer, and every investor in today's market. Dare ye buy at the top?
Every day, Nasdaq.com publishes a list of the market's top stocks -- the companies whose shares have just hit their highest intraday price of any time in the past 52 weeks. Every day, investors read this list and tremble -- some with greed (big mo', baby!), and others in pure, unmitigated, acrophobic terror (whatever you do, don't look down).
Over on Motley Fool CAPS, thousands of investors just like you are watching these same companies and voting their gut on whether they'll keep rising or stumble and fall. Usually, the ratings wax optimistic as stocks hit new highs -- because everyone loves a winner. But what do you make of it when some of the smartest investors out there are panning a hot stock?
You could heed them. You could ignore them. You could take the stock tickers and construct anagrams from 'em. For my money, though, the best course of action is to use the "52-week high" list as just a starting point for further research. After all, stocks can go up for many reasons, and it's up to you to decide how worthy those reasons are. But thanks to Motley Fool CAPS, now you don't have to make the decision alone.
With that said, let's meet today's list of contenders, drawn from the latest "52-week high" list at Nasdaq.com. What does our panel of more than 60,000 stock gurus (and counting) have to say about them?
|
Stock |
One Year Ago Today |
Currently Fetching |
|
|---|---|---|---|
|
Playtex |
$9.55 |
$18.31 |
***** |
|
China Life Insurance |
$23.01 |
$59.06 |
**** |
|
Boeing |
$77.78 |
$102.07 |
**** |
|
BP |
$67.10 |
$73.94 |
**** |
|
Deere |
$70.71 |
$131.60 |
**** |
|
Monsanto |
$41.10 |
$69.79 |
**** |
|
Amazon.com |
$33.67 |
$73.69 |
* |
Everybody loves a winner
When stocks soar on the wings of success, you'd expect bears to become rare. So it's no surprise when we see that out of all the stocks on today's list, the community of CAPS investors pans just one. That stock: None other than our very own Motley Fool Stock Advisor recommendation Amazon.com, a stock that's become nearly a five-bagger for us since Fool co-Founder and Stock Advisor co-advisor David Gardner recommended it in October 2002.
If you're curious whether David thinks Amazon's a buy at today's lofty price, don't be shy! All you have to do is ask for access to his latest update on his stock picks, and we'll give you access for free for 30 full days. Click here to get started. Meanwhile, here's what a few of the very highest-rated Amazon bears have to say about the stock:
Bears on the Amazon
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TMFBent, a perennial CAPS All-Star and my own Foolish colleague, keeps his pitch short and to the point: "AMZN still doesn't produce cash flow to justify the market cap. I don't think it ever will." Take that, David Gardner!
-
MysterInsidious explains Amazon's surging stock price -- up 150% over the past year, in case you hadn't noticed -- thusly: "A short squeeze is currently driving the price up rapidly. Once the short squeeze runs out of steam, the smart investors will quickly take their profits off the table, and a new group of shorts will jump on driving the price back down by at least 10%." Hmm. Then again, he wrote this three months ago. I don't know about you, but I don't see a 10% slump anywhere in this stock chart.
- Yet MysterInsidious is far from alone in questioning how far a short squeeze can take a stock in the long term. Still another CAPS All-Star, darkflame, asks in amazement: "PE higher than 100?? Where did I see this story before ? hmmm ... lemme think ... ahhhhh, I know!!! Back in 2000 when Yahoo joined the S&P500, there were not many shares on the market and the stock price was squeezed into showing a whoooooping P/E higher than 100. ... AMZN is a great company, Jeff Bezos is a great visionary, I love shopping online at amazon.com ... but Amazon isnt worth this much. It isnt worth this much. Let me say it again, it isnt worth this much."
Time to chime in
What are you trying to tell us, darkflame? I just don't get it.
But perhaps one of our more astute readers does? Come on over to CAPS and decipher darkflame's argument for the slower kids in class. And if you've got some thoughts of your own on Amazon, then, hey, tell us about those, too.
Motley Fool CAPS: It's fun, it's free, and it just might make you famous.
Fool contributor Rich Smith does not own shares of any company named above. You can find him on CAPS, publicly pontificating under the handle TMFDitty, where he's currently ranked No. 630 out of more than 60,000 investors. The Fool has a disclosure policy.
