Hitting fresh highs can either signal that a stock is on its way to greatness, or that it has run its course. Even with the risk of the latter, searching for these outperformers can reveal companies that are doing something right, much to their investors' delight.

I'm a poet and didn't know it
With that in mind, we'll use the aggregate intelligence of the 110,000-plus investors participating in Motley Fool CAPS to find stocks hitting 52-week highs today. The community's approval (signaled by four- and five-star ratings) could indicate that further research is in order.

Here are three such stocks:

 Company

Today’s High

Industry

CAPS Rating

Fools Saying Outperform

Qualcomm (NASDAQ:QCOM)

$54.51

Telecommunications

****

1,116 of 1,226

Illumina (NASDAQ:ILMN)

$92.60

Drugs

***

337 of 380

Johnson & Johnson (NYSE:JNJ)

$69.25

Drugs

*****

8,483 of 8,837

Source: Motley Fool CAPS, as of July 24, 2008.

Other five-star drug companies:

  • Genzyme (NASDAQ:GENZ) -- up 25.9% in the past year.
  • Gilead Sciences (NASDAQ:GILD) -- up 38.7% in the past year.

Other five-star telecommunications companies:

  • America Movil (NYSE:AMX) -- stock price is 25.7% cheaper than a year ago.
  • Harris (NYSE:HRS) -- stock price is 11.9% cheaper than a year ago.

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