A 1-in-100 Investor

The first 100 days in office sets the tone for any new President. Similarly, Motley Fool CAPS keeps an eye on how investors do in their first 100 days. Some of our best -- we call them All-Stars -- have achieved scores of 100 on stock selections in their first 100 days on CAPS. Since data shows that the best stocks to buy and sell have earned top CAPS ratings, might we also assume a correlation when the best players rate the best stocks?

One of our highest-rated CAPS members is BeautifulPlumage, who sports a near-perfect 99.95 member rating. A member since September 2006, BeautifulPlumage currently has 137 active picks on CAPS, out of more than 430 stock picks made. Achieving 80% accuracy, BeautifulPlumage has also attracted 19 "groupies," CAPS players who've listed this leading investor as one of their favorites.

Here are a few of this top member's most recent stock selections and how they were rated.

Source: Motley Fool CAPS.
*Price when call was made. Current score is how many points a member is beating (lagging) the S&P 500 index from the time of the call.

Let's take a look at what other CAPS members are saying about these stocks, and whether they agree with this top member's assessment.

Citigroup
Although the upheavals in the financial markets is one of the biggest stories in recent memory, not every institution is on the brink of collapse. However, just because they're not in imminent danger doesn't mean they're inspiring investments, either. CAPS member SapphireSeas looks at the wreckage on Wall Street and suggests that as cheap as Citigroup looks right now, it'll look cheaper in the months to come:

Fannie, Freddie, and Lehman taking it on the chin...

Merrill Lynch being absorbed by Bank of America...

More rough waters and consolidation ahead. Mortgage Crisis still wreaking havoc, likely to weigh down global economy through 2009.

While Citi may appear a good buy right now, it'll look even better in a few weeks or months. Should be right about the time recession-driven consumer debt starts piling up on the plastic, and lifting the [C] boat-but not just yet.

Wachovia
That also seems to be the consensus among many CAPS members regarding Wachovia. ww2004, for instance, was fairly prescient back in May , noting that subprime mortgages aren't the only problems facing the industry. Wachovia, through its Golden West acquisition, has $122 billion worth of option ARM mortgages, far outstripping second-place Washington Mutual (NYSE:WM) at $53 billion. With non-performing loans increasing, this could put the banking giant in a more precarious position.

There is a lot of speculation that the worst of the credit crisis is over. If sub-prime were the only concern that might be true but the next wave will be prime borrowers with option ARM loans. As average house prices continue to fall and option ARM rates begin to reset, over the next year banks like [Wachovia] and [WaMu] will continue to perform poorly. Golden West, now part of Wachovia, created the option arm and has billions of dollars of exposure, much of it concentrated in hard-hit California.

A 1-in-100 opportunity
Some of the best and smartest members in the CAPS investor intelligence community have made their mark, but it pays to start your own research on these stocks on Motley Fool CAPS. Read a company's financial reports, scrutinize key data and charts, and examine the comments your fellow investors have made -- all from a stock's CAPS page.

As hockey great Wayne Gretzky once noted, "You miss 100% of the shots you never take." At Motley Fool CAPS, every investor's opinion counts, and since it's free to sign up, why not use this opportunity to take your best shot?