Mad Money Recap

Return to Article

Cramer's 'Mad Money' Recap: Fielder's Choice: Wrigley

TheStreet.com Staff

Click here for an archive of Cramer's "Mad Money" recaps.

"All week I've been giving my list of transformational CEOs," the bankable managers that change the route of their respective companies, Jim Cramer told viewers of his "Mad Money" TV show Thursday.

As part of the weeklong segment, the next transformational manager Cramer called out was William Perez, the CEO of William Wrigley (WWY Quote - Cramer on WWY - Stock Picks).

Some of the other transformational CEOs Cramer named earlier in the week, such as Honeywell's (HON Quote - Cramer on HON - Stock Picks) Dave Cote or Hewlett-Packard's (HPQ Quote - Cramer on HPQ - Stock Picks) Mark Hurd, faced the challenge of turning companies around from previous bad management. Cramer owns H-P for his charitable trust, Action Alerts PLUS.

However, Perez faced no such challenge, Cramer said.

Perez's problem, he said, was how to break Wrigley out from its "cozy position" of doing just enough to make money without ruffling the feathers of Executive Chairman Bill Wrigley. Perez managed to do this in a short time, and now the growth at Wrigley is accelerating.

Perez took the "sleepy" company and re-energized it without upsetting the Wrigley family, Cramer said. The reason he believes Perez was able to do this is because Perez previously held the position of CEO at another family-run business called S. C. Johnson & Son. Perez had the experience of dealing with a family-run company, Cramer said.

"The era of upside surprises for Wrigley has now begun," he said. Although the stock might seem expensive, its estimates are too low, he said. "Wrigley is a triple buy."

Solar Tsunami

Cramer started off his "Sell Block" segment by making some changes to his CEO Wall of Shame. He pardoned IBM's (IBM Quote - Cramer on IBM - Stock Picks) Sam Palmisano. And he removed Bausch & Lomb's (BOL Quote - Cramer on BOL - Stock Picks) Ronald Zarrella and replaced him with Syntax-Brillian's (BRLC Quote - Cramer on BRLC - Stock Picks) Vincent Sollitto.

Although he feels good about "nailing the retailers last week," Cramer said that "Mad Money" cares more about the future and what can make people money now. However, past trends can sometimes make market players money as well or keep them from losing it, he said.

One of the best calls he made last year was saying the investment banks were flooding investors with ethanol stocks, Cramer said. Now "solar monsoon season is here and upon us," and he's seeing the same overload in solar this year as he saw in ethanol last year.

There is a "textbook oversupply" of solar now, Cramer said. There's SunPower (SPWR Quote - Cramer on SPWR - Stock Picks), Evergreen Solar (ESLR Quote - Cramer on ESLR - Stock Picks) and Trina Solar (TSL Quote - Cramer on TSL - Stock Picks). Plus, there are four solar initial public offerings coming to market, he said.

"There simply is an excess of solar, which should lead to dramatically lower prices in this group," Cramer said. This is why he believes people should sell every single solar stock they have in their portfolio, including his solar pick First Solar (FSLR Quote - Cramer on FSLR - Stock Picks).

Because there is a major lockup expiring in First Solar, Cramer believes that viewers should sell this stock.

Although Cramer told viewers he believes that solar stocks have "become too dangerous to own," there is one worth owning here, he said. The name of the stock is Cypress Semiconductor (CY Quote - Cramer on CY - Stock Picks).

Even though Cypress looks more like a tech stock, Cramer said the company owns $2.4 billion of SunPower. Periodically there are such misvaluations or "steals" on Wall Street that "you have to take advantage of them before the insiders do," he said. Cypress is one of those stocks.

The market is not valuing the company as it should be, Cramer said. But Cypress knows this and is buying back stock. "They're not oblivious to the action," he said.

Cramer said he believes T. J. Rodgers, the company's CEO, should call a private equity firm, and then as a private entity split itself into two businesses. This could create twice what the market is valuing the company at, he said, calling Cypress a buy.

The Real Deal

Steven Ells, Chipotle Mexican Grill's (CMG Quote - Cramer on CMG - Stock Picks) founder, chairman and CEO, joined Cramer on his show and spoke to his company's success.

"We think we do something differently, and people are really catching on," he said.

Ells said he started his first restaurant 14 years ago. He wanted to show that just because it's fast doesn't mean it's a fast food restaurant in terms of the food, service and experience.

"We try to do things better," he said. For example, Chipotle, Ells said, started out offering fresh food, and it still does that. "But now fresh isn't enough anymore. You need to know where it came from and how it was raised," he said.

It's not the customers asking for quality, Ells said. "We think it's the right thing to do," and once people are turned on to it, they'll appreciate it, he said.

Cramer called Ells and Chipotle "the real deal" and said that any time there's a decline in this stock, people should pull the trigger and buy some.

To view Cramer's interview with Steven Ells, please click here.

Lightning Round

Cramer was bullish on Potash (POT Quote - Cramer on POT - Stock Picks), Monsanto (MON Quote - Cramer on MON - Stock Picks), Agrium (AGU Quote - Cramer on AGU - Stock Picks), Cisco (CSCO Quote - Cramer on CSCO - Stock Picks), Virgin Media (VMED Quote - Cramer on VMED - Stock Picks), Clearwire (CLWR Quote - Cramer on CLWR - Stock Picks), ViaSat (VSAT Quote - Cramer on VSAT - Stock Picks), ING Group (ING Quote - Cramer on ING - Stock Picks), Cleveland-Cliffs (CLF Quote - Cramer on CLF - Stock Picks), 3M (MMM Quote - Cramer on MMM - Stock Picks), Dynegy (DYN Quote - Cramer on DYN - Stock Picks), El Paso (EP Quote - Cramer on EP - Stock Picks) and Halliburton (HAL Quote - Cramer on HAL - Stock Picks).

Cramer was bearish on Harris Interactive (HPOL Quote - Cramer on HPOL - Stock Picks), Lamar Advertising (LAMR Quote - Cramer on LAMR - Stock Picks), HMS Holdings (HMSY Quote - Cramer on HMSY - Stock Picks) and Giant Industries (GI Quote - Cramer on GI - Stock Picks).

For more of Cramer's insights during the most recent Lightning Round, click here.

Pop Quiz! Are you a loyal "Mad Money" viewer? Take TheStreet.com's new "Mad Money" culture quiz to see how much of the show you caught last week or just to immerse yourself in Cramer's nonfinancial madness.

Want more Cramer? Check out Jim's rules and commandments for investing from his popular book by clicking here.