Cramer's 'Mad Money' Recap: A Mid-Cap Numbers Game

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It's time to pay Homage to Catalonia, says Jim Cramer, who used the reference to George Orwell's memoir of the Spanish Civil War to open his "Mad Money" TV show Thursday.

It's time to pay homage because the Spanish town is one of the many local governments willing to "stick it to their constituents," Cramer told viewers.

Catalonia last year hired Scientific Games(SGMS - Cramer's Take - Stockpickr) to run its instant lottery business, and "we love lotteries on 'Mad Money,'" he said.

"These instant lottery games are just pathologic predators of the poor," he said, referring to the business of scratch cards and instant lottery tickets that he believes are often money down the drain for those who buy them.

These games are a great way for state and local governments to close budgetary gaps, he said.

Plus, Scientific Games just got added to the S&P MidCap 400 today. When a company is added to the S&P 500, it usually sees a one-time spike in its share price, he said.

But he said that when a company is added to the S&P MidCap index, it often sees a sustainable, long-term rise in its price. This is because "no one wants to own large-caps anymore." Instead, he said, investors want to pour money into mid-cap companies that will become the next large-caps.

Cramer said that the last 19 stocks to be added to the mid-cap index have seen an average return of 34.66%.

Four-Part Emcore

Wall Street doesn't like confusing companies because having a lot of different businesses makes it difficult to judge a stocks' value, Cramer said. "But confusing companies can make you money as long as they've got legs." And he said that Emcore(EMKR - Cramer's Take - Stockpickr) has four hot money-making businesses.

The first is its optical business, which sells products to Cisco Systems(CSCO - Cramer's Take - Stockpickr). Cramer has been bullish on optical stocks including JDSU(JDSU - Cramer's Take - Stockpickr), Conexant Systems(CNXT - Cramer's Take - Stockpickr) and Ciena(CIEN - Cramer's Take - Stockpickr).

Phone companies are switching to fiber from copper lines in order to compete with cable companies, he said. And this rollout means big business for companies like Emcore, which makes high-end optical components and subsystems.

He said that Emcore has a superior solar panel business that is able to convert more sunlight to electricity than its competitors.

He said that its cell-phone business lost money but he's willing to tolerate the loss because it also grew revenue at more than 100%.

Finally, he said that Emcore's most promising business is the next-generation lighting product it is developing with General Electric(GE - Cramer's Take - Stockpickr). GE is the parent of CNBC, which airs "Mad Money."

This is a company with four great ways to win, he said.