Each day, The Wall Street Journal publishes a list of large-cap winners. Here are Friday's best:

Company

Closing Price

CAPS Rating
(out of 5)

% Change

52-Week Range

Nike (NYSE:NKE)

$63.15

****

3.51%

$44.08-$63.44

Kroger (NYSE:KR)

$29.82

***

2.65%

$21.12-$31.94

Freeport-McMoRan (NYSE:FCX)

$116.42

*****

2.61%

$48.85-$120.20

Avon Products (NYSE:AVP)

$38.40

***

2.29%

$28.99-$41.85

Progressive (NYSE:PGR)

$19.80

**

1.90%

$18.88-$25.35
Sources: The Wall Street Journal, Yahoo! Finance, Motley Fool CAPS.

Our top gainer, championship cobbler Nike, was up for reasons not yet reported. So be it. We Fools prefer buy-to-hold stock stories anyway. Are any of our large-cap leaders worth owning over the next three to five years?

We already know that Freeport could be. Same with Nike. But the more than 65,000 professional and amateur investors in our Motley Fool CAPS database are far less optimistic when it comes to insurer Progressive. Here are some of the reasons why they think it could be a stock worth shorting.

Investor imabugger writes:

[U]sed to be a pricing leader, now has diminished return on overcomplicated structure and the [competition] is catching up. [Progressive] is the [General Motors] of insurance companies and the date is 1970.

Kirsten11 adds:

Employees are quitting right and left, customer service is at an all time low, overall business will start to suffer...

Do you agree? Disagree? Let us know what you think by signing up for CAPS today. It's 100% free to participate.

See you back here tomorrow for more of the best of the biggest.

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