csco

"The health care picks in our growth portfolio should prosper whatever the outcome of the raging health care debate," suggests growth stock specialist Stephen Leeb.

In The Complete Investor, he explains, "That's because they're leveraged to demographic realities, and in particular to the tide of aging baby boomers," Here, he reviews on portfolio holding -- Teva Pharmaceuticals (NASDAQ: TEVA).

Leeb says, "Israel-based Teva Pharmaceutical is the world's largest manufacturer of generic drugs. Capitalized at $49 billion, Teva pulled in some $11 billion in revenues in 2008, with generic drugs contributing more than two-thirds of those sales.

Venture capital investment in clean technology grew 10% from the second quarter to the third this year. According to a report by the Cleantech Group and Deloitte, 134 companies received investments of $1.59 billion – up from $1.2 billion in the second quarter. The sector's upward trajectory continues, with last quarter marking the second in a row of double-digit growth. In the first quarter of 2009, venture capital investment in cleantech companies hit a low of $1 billion.

The strong third quarter has made the cleantech sector the largest in the venture capital business, according to the Cleantech Group, pulling ahead of biotech. Twenty-seven percent of venture capital funds invested in the second quarter of 2009 went to cleantech companies – up from 3% at the beginning of 2004.

"Reflecting the stability and maturity of its economy and financial markets, Israel was recently upgraded to developed-market status," says fund expert Mark Salzinger.

In The Investor's ETF Report, he looks at iShares MSCI Israel Capped Investable Market ETF (NYSE: EIS), noting, "For a nation of just more than seven million people, Israel generates exceptional economic productivity."

"GDP per capita was recently $28,200, good for 49th in the world, very close to established developed markets like New Zealand and Italy.

Oil prices dropped a bit today, as investors weigh news that consumer confidence took a hit in September.

Today's move was not a sizable one, but further evidence that investors are concerned over just how strong the current economic recovery really is. News came out today that consumer confidence is down in September as more Americans are concerned over the weak job market.

The oil industry has been working hard to find new oil reserves, and so far this year the efforts have been paying off.

It has been a year with some major discoveries that have put the oil industry in a good position to make it the year with the highest level of new discoveries since 2000.

A big reason for the increase in discoveries is improvements in technology that has allowed oil hunters to drill deeper and break through tougher rocks than they were previously able to do.

The Cabot Benjamin Graham Value Letter focuses on stocks that meet the strict value criteria of the legendary investor. Here, J. Royden Ward looks to Teva Pharmaceutical (NASDAQ: TEVA), noting, "Teva is based in Israel and develops, makes and sells generic and proprietary-branded (store brand) drugs."

The advisor explains, "The company is one of the largest generic drug-producing companies in the world and, in addition, sells active ingredients to other pharmaceutical companies.

"Teva's aggressive acquisition and product development programs are driving strong sales growth. The company recently purchased U.S.-based Barr Pharmaceuticals for $7.5 billion. Barr will increase Teva's generic drug sales significantly in the U.S. and parts of Europe.

"Our latest pick is a bet on a low-profile foreign market, Israel, which has turned out to be one of the world's top performers this year," says Nicholas Vardy.

In The Global Bull Market Alert, he explains, We recommend the iShares MSCI Israel Cap Invest Market Index (NYSE: EIS), as I expect the Israeli market to continue to perform well over the next few months."

"Global markets continue to be locked in a trading range, consolidating their gains of the last four months; this kind of see-saw trading is actually quite typical of the summer months, and I expect the range-bound trading to continue.

Noble Energy (NYSE: NBL - option chain) shares have risen this higher morning after the company announced a major natural gas discovery in the Tamar prospect in the Mediterranean Sea off the coast of Israel. NBL owns a 36% stake in the well, and company CEO Charles Davidson called the find the largest discovery in the company's history.

If you think that the stock won't fall by too much in the coming months, then now could be a good time to look at a bullish hedged trade on NBL.

NBL opened this morning at $50.44. So far today the stock has hit a low of $47.59 and a high of $50.50. As of 12:15, NBL is trading at $49.77, up 2.98 (6.4%). The chart for NBL looks neutral and S&P gives NBL a 3 STARS (out of 5) hold ranking.

For a bullish hedged play on this stock, I would consider a February bull-put credit spread below the $35 range. A bull-put credit spread is an options position that combines the purchase and sale of put options to hedge risk in case the stock doesn't do what you think, but still leverages nice returns. For this particular trade, we will make a 6.4% return in just four weeks as long as NBL is above $35 at February expiration. Noble would have to fall by more than 29% before we would start to lose money. Learn more about this type of trade here.

NBL hasn't been below $35 in the past year except for two days in October and has shown support around $41 recently.

Brent Archer is an options analyst and writer at Investors Observer.

DISCLOSURE: Mr. Archer owns and/or controls diversified portfolios of long and short stock and option positions that may include holdings in companies he writes about. At publication time, Brent neither owns nor controls positions in NBL.

As violence continues to hammer the Gaza Strip, Muslim groups are calling for a boycott of goods produced by The Coca-Cola Company (NYSE: KO), Starbucks Corporation (NASDAQ: SBUX), and other U.S. companies. The boycott is meant to protest the alliance between Israel and the U.S., and it comes as the U.S. embassy in Malaysia is being swarmed with thousands of angry protesters.

"We urge Muslim consumers internationally to unite so that we can teach a lesson to Israel and its allies," said Ma'amor Osman, an official with the Muslim Consumers Association of Malaysia. "This is to object to the arrogance and cruelty of Israel and its allies towards the Palestinians."

Additionally, the group is urging the Malaysian government to cease its contract agreements with U.S.-based firms. Former Malaysian premier Mahathir Mohamad is also jumping on the bandwagon, calling for Muslims to stop using the U.S. dollar. "If enough of us do this, then [the dollar's] value will fall, just like what they did to us in 1997," he asserted.

I realize it goes without saying, but times are tough for American auto makers, really tough in fact, and for Ford (NYSE: F), the company does not see things changing any time soon, and is predicting another disastrous month for December sales for the ailing auto industry.

The company announced today that it believes when final December sales figures are released, we are going to see a horrible month, with Ford estimating that industry-wide, December sales will probably be around 35% lower than the same period last year.

When you consider the estimated December numbers you can start to get a feel for just how bad 2008 has been. Consider this: in 2007, industry-wide sales of light vehicles in America totaled 16.2 million. In 2008, that number is expected to drop dramatically down to around 13.2 million light vehicles in reaction to lower consumer spending and tightened credit lending.

Yesterday, I was pleased to pay $1.66 for mid-grade gasoline and I was wondering whether it would drop further or rise. But now I have an answer -- Israeli attacks in Gaza Strip are enriching the oil-producing countries that surround it. More specifically, oil prices have increased $3 a barrel to more than $40, while the price of gold is up 2% to $881.85 -- a 30% rise above its 13-month low two months ago.

Will the violence in the Middle East continue? If so, for how long? My guess is that Israel is planning a ground war which will last for several weeks -- the timing of the move takes advantage of the transition of power between Bush and Obama and posturing before January's Israeli election.

In the meantime, the key question for investors is whether they should buy energy stocks -- they will almost certainly rise today and will continue to go up as long as the possibility remains of escalation -- in the form of an military or economic attack, such as an oil embargo, on Israel and Western interests from other Middle Eastern countries. If there is an escalation, we could see a big spike in oil prices which would help energy investors.

But that could cause an even deeper economic slowdown which would cause oil prices to collapse even more once the violence ends.

Peter Cohan is President of Peter S. Cohan & Associates. He also teaches management at Babson College. His eighth book, You Can't Order Change: Lessons From Jim McNerney's Turnaround at Boeing, was published by Portfolio on December 26, 2008

It was July 1, 2008 when I first posted Serious Money: Five stable stocks for troubled times. The title speaks for itself. This update, after nine weeks and horrible market conditions, is through Friday October 3, 2008.

The index for comparison is the Standard & Poor's 500 Index, which closed on June 30, 2008 at 1,280.00. The S&P closed Friday at 1,099.23 , down 14.12%.

Each of my five picks is beating the market and three of the five are actually up despite crushing news in the financial sector, unemployment and housing. Congress did pass a Wall Street backstop/bailout bill that President Bush has signed, but only after adding another 450 pages and $130 billion to the amount. Although the five stocks have averaged a 0.75% loss, as intended, they easily beat the S&P by 13.37%.

Here are the five stocks that I still think are worth considering. For my original rationale see the linked story above.

1) Johnson and Johnson (NYSE: JNJ) -- when recommended, the stock closed at $64.34 and paid a 2.89% dividend yield. It closed Friday at $66.16 -- up 2.75%. JNJ was featured in Barron's this month as the most respected from the top 100 companies in the world.

2) Teva Pharmaceuticals ADR (NASDAQ: TEVA) -- when recommended, the stock closed at $45.80 and paid a 1% dividend yield. It closed October 3 at $46.08 -- up 0.06% 0.62% Teva (of Isreal) is the largest generic drug company in the world and just got bigger through the acquisition of Barr Pharmaceuticals last month.

This post is part of a series in which TheStockAdvisors.com asked financial experts to name their top stock pick if McCain or if Obama wins the election.

"If John McCain becomes president, look to Elbit Systems (NASDAQ: ESLT); this company is one of Israel's top defense companies," explains high-technology and science-focused sector stock specialist Gregg Early in his The Real Nanotech Investor.

"Elbit is well respected throughout the world for its skilled work in a variety of defense sectors. It has significant operations in North America, Europe and, of course, the Middle East and the sub-continent of Asia.

"Its big growth sectors now are UAVs for defense/intelligence work and hardware and software upgrades for aircraft and helicopters, the latter being a core to the company's business for years.

"With the global economy slowing down, many nations prefer to hang on to their aging equipment rather than buy new, expensive fleets, train pilots and retrain all the service and maintenance workers.

"This company is already growing but a President McCain, who's a former military man and who sees the strategic value of our close ties with Israel as a fulcrum in the Middle East, would likely find key companies in the region to reward as an example of what cooperation with the U.S. can do. And defense is the best place to start."

Steven Halpern's TheStockAdvisors.com offers a daily look at the latest market commentary and favorite stock picks and investment ideas from the nation's leading financial newsletter advisors.

This post is part of a series in which TheStockAdvisors.com asked financial experts to name their top stock pick if McCain or if Obama wins the election.

Which stocks would benefit from a victory by either Senator John McCain or Senator Barack Obama? To help investors sort through the sectors and stocks best positioned to benefit in a post-election environment, we posed this question to some of the nation's leading financial newsletter advisors.

Importantly, this is not a partisan report; each participating advisor has provided a favorite stock for both candidates, focused not on political preferences but unbiased stock analysis. Below we feature those stocks and ETFs that the advisors believe will be the winners depending on which candidate prevails.

McCain Stocks:

Roger Conrad - Comcast (NYSE: CCW)
Gregg Early - Elbit Systems (NASDAQ: ESLT)
Elliott Gue - Paladin Resources (Toronto: PDN)
Doug Fabian - Market Vectors Nuclear Energy (NYSE: NLR)
Vivian Lewis - Barclays (NYSE: BCS)
Bill Martin - CGG Veritas (NYSE: CGV)'
Yiannis Mostrous - Lonking Holdings (OTC: CIMHF)
Carla Pasternak - Eaton Vance Tax-Advantaged Dividend Income Fund (NYSE: EVT)
Nate Pile - SPDR Gold Trust (NYSE: GLD)
John Reese - General Dynamics (NYSE: GD)
Nathan Slaughter - USEC (NYSE: USU)
Paul Tracy - Shaw Group (NYSE: SGR)
Kelley Wright - CenturyTel (NYSE: CTL)
Tom Vass - Molex (NASDAQ: MOLX)
Martin Hutchinson - Northrop Grumman (NYSE: NOC), Merck & Co. (NYSE: MRK), EOG Resources (NYSE: EOG)

Obama Stocks:

Roger Conrad - SunPower (NASDAQ: SPWR)
Gregg Early - AeroVironment (NASDAQ: AVAV)
Elliott Gue - SunPower (NASDAQ: SPWR)
Doug Fabian - Industrial Select Sector SPDR (NYSE: XLI)
Vivian Lewis - Cosan (NYSE: CZZ)
Bill Martin - Geron (NASDAQ: GERN)
Yiannis Mostrous - Dr. Reddy's (NYSE: RDY)
Carla Pasternak - Kinder Morgan Energy Partners (NYSE: KMP)
Nate Pile - Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL)
John Reese - American Eagle (NYSE: AEO)
Nathan Slaughter - Fluor (NYSE: FLR)
Paul Tracy - Market Vectors Global Alternative Energy (NYSE: GEX)
Kelley Wright - Cardinal Health (NYSE: CAH)
Tom Vass - Ingersoll Rand (NYSE: IR)
Martin Hutchinson - Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT), Time Warner Inc. (NYSE: TWX), First Solar (NASDAQ: FSLR)

Yesterday's announcement by Freddie Mac (NYSE: FRE) to cut but not eliminate its dividend payment got me wondering if there were other companies out there with absurdly high dividend yields that hadn't cut their payments. High-dividend yields are an old-fashioned way to look at companies and one that's fallen out of fashion as tech companies plowed their profits into research. But a 10% yield -- hey even a 7% yield -- is something we'd all be happy to find these days.

Traditionally, companies with high-dividend yields were those with low-growth potential, like utilities. Like Freddie, many of the current high-yield companies were created by a falling stock price. And like Freddie, they could always cut the dividend to keep the yield from getting out of whack. But, if they think the stock will rebound, maybe they won't cut it for fear the dividend cut would be yet another thing to drive off investors.

The highest yielding big company I found was Biovail (NYSE: BVF), Canada's biggest drug maker. The company was hit with an SEC complaint that key executives were lying about earnings. The company and the founder just settled a fight over the future direction of the company -- with the founder stepping aside. The stock, at about $10, has been cut in half in the last year. In May the company declared a quarterly dividend of 37.5 cents a share, which gives it a 15% yield at the current price.