Every day, the sun rises on Wall Street, and a plethora of professional analysts greet the day with new opinions on stocks. Here at the Fool, we use our "This Just In" column to examine some of these picks -- and the track record of the company behind them -- so investors can make better decisions.
In addition to following professional banks, anyone can use Motley Fool CAPS to monitor the collective opinions of more than 110,000 investors, many of whom demonstrate better investing insight than published analysts do.
Enough top-performing CAPS investors have turned bullish on Cogent (NYSE:COGT) recently to upgrade it from its long held four-star rank to the highest grade of five stars. A total of 536 investors have rated Cogent, with many of them offering -- dare I say it? -- cogent analyses and commentary to explain the recent optimism.
A leader in automated biometric identification, Cogent has grown rapidly as governments and state agencies around the world look for fast and reliable methods to identify people. While it hasn't nabbed every contract, the company has been successful against competitors, such as Motorola (NYSE:MOT) and L-1 Identity Solutions (NYSE:ID), and maintained high margins that drive solid cash flow.
Investors see a long list of potential government contracts in its future. Cogent answered any questions about growth by first raising guidance for its first-quarter earnings and then following through with $14.4 million in net income. Cogent also hopes to play a significant role in a potential $1 billion contract defense contractor Lockheed Martin (NYSE:LMT) won over Northrop Grumman (NYSE:NOC) and IBM (NYSE:IBM) to build their next-generation fingerprint and biometrics database.
With insiders owning more than half the company, CAPS investors largely agree that the stock will be a winner. In fact, nearly 97% of the 536 investors rating the company expect it to outperform the market in the future.
To see what the very best CAPS analysts say now about Cogent -- and other winning stocks they pick -- head to CAPS and have a look. The community research and resources in CAPS are totally free, unlike analyst opinions reserved for paying clients.
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