5 Stocks to Steer Through Rough Waters

Keeping your portfolio above water in these markets is no easy task. When companies can be whipsawed by the whimsical musings of the Treasury Department or the Fed, an investor who has successfully navigated those rough waters is a rare bird. Doing it over time makes it all the more special.

The All-Stars in the Motley Fool CAPS investor-intelligence database have found themselves particularly adroit at steering their picks through these turbulent markets, and have done so consistently. CAPS has been successfully marking the performance of the best stocks for more than two years now, so we'll look at some of the recent picks of this community's longtime investing mavens.

If these All-Stars have been able to maintain their top status through bull and bear markets, then it might be worth keeping an eye on how they think stocks will perform in the months and years ahead.

Rowing against the current
Pfizer suffered a setback in its attempt to get erectile dysfunction therapy Viagra approved as an over-the-counter medicine in Europe. While the company may reapply at a later date, the short-term prognosis remains pretty grim. That's going to pull sales down for the little blue pill, which already faces tough competition from Eli Lilly's (NYSE:LLY) Cialis, as well as Levitra, which is a joint marketing venture between GlaxoSmithKline (NYSE:GSK), Schering-Plough, and Bayer.

CAPS member rockambo thinks Pfizer has been disappointing lately in a business model based on blockbuster drugs:

so lots of good things are happen to this company, but they haven't recovered from the blockbuster business model and there's about one potential drug in the pipeline and a whole lot of expiring patents. Longterm I see growth, shortterm, lots of pain medication and suffering.

Investing in precious metals often requires a belief that inflationary pressures will devalue the currency, making gold, silver, and the like more valuable. While we are perhaps entering into a deflationary period right now, CAPS member ardyes703 sees the bill coming due on this year's deluge of government intervention, which will boost Silver Wheaton. And with the next president promising a public works program the likes of which hasn’t been seen since the 1950s, there is a groundswell of pressure building beneath precious metals prices; ardyes703 writes:

It's not surprise that commodities have been pummeled this year along with their paper counterparts; their respective stocks ([SPDR Gold Shares], [Apex Silver Mines], etc...) Silver Wheaton though is special. Not only are they still performing admirably considering spot silver is down about 50% from its $17/oz highs, but because their fixed cost contracts give them a huge edge over the competition. Face it, spot silver will not stay in the single-digits for long, especially in 2009-2010 when the hangover of "bail-out" mania devalues the US$even further. This is why [Silver Wheaton] is my 12-month play of the year.

Ahoy there!
Whether you've been in the markets for years or are brand-new to the investing world, 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. Then share your views with the CAPS community on whether these old salts have the wind in their sails.