#-ad_banner-#Investing in tech stocks can be quite tricky. The biggest players such as Microsoft (Nasdaq: MSFT), Dell (Nasdaq: DELL), Cisco Systems (Nasdaq: CSCO) and Hewlettt-Packard (NYSE: HPQ) are struggling to find growth. The industry’s smallest players can post impressive growth in short stretches, but they can also plunge in value… Read More

With the maturity of the automotive industry in developed markets, the real growth potential lies primarily in emerging markets. Emerging markets account for close to 40% of the global market and were recently estimated to have produced 30 million vehicles. By most measures, China… Read More

Many investors wish they had invested earlier or more substantially in one or more of the BRIC countries: Brazil, Russia, India and China. In the mid-1990s the writing was on the wall that China and other emerging markets were headed for bigger and… Read More

Airlines are one of those industries that just don’t get any respect from investors. These long-suffering companies have a history of losses and usually carry a lot of debt. Billionaire investor Warren Buffett took notice of these qualities and summed it all up when he wrote, “The worst sort of… Read More

#-ad_banner-#A dozen years ago, Silicon Valley was responsible for one of the most prolific initial public offering (IPO) markets ever seen. Many fortunes were made, as a record 486 companies went public in 1999. The next year was the second-best ever, with 406 additional… Read More

Here’s something many investors probably don’t know about major drug makers like Pfizer (NYSE: PFE), Bristol-Meyers Squibb (NYSE: BMY), Eli Lilly (NYSE: LLY) and others (collectively known as Big Pharma): They’re a lot like the major car companies. To save money back in the 1970s, the auto… Read More

Turmoil in Libya and other places in the Middle East have caused capital to flow out of equity markets and into traditional safe havens such as gold and silver. Surprisingly, one of the equity sectors that was least affected by the shift was emerging… Read More

One fund is paying a tempting 11% yield. Another offers 8%. Which one should you reach for? To answer that, you need to ask the right question. #-ad_banner-#The question is not,… Read More

Long-time readers of my articles will notice a predilection for the phrase “love ’em when they’re hated.” That phrase has surely applied to Barnes & Noble (NYSE: BKS) after its stock fell 80% in the past five years to less than $10 a share. Many had concluded that the nation’s… Read More

It’s among the scarcest metals on the planet. There’s only one large above-ground store, a strategic reserve the Soviet Union spent 50 years accumulating. Russia decided to put the stockpile up for sale in 1990 when it was estimated to total 27 million ounces. Since then, buyers… Read More