Commercial Paper Plan Helps the Good Ones

Editor's note: Jim Cramer will present his 2009 stock outlook for the first time at TheStreet.com Investment Conference on Saturday, Oct. 25. Click for details.

Commercial paper matters for certain. We need to unfreeze this market, as this is the major market for many industrial companies. It matters for companies like GE (GE Quote - Cramer on GE - Stock Picks) with its AAA-rated balance sheet and good commercial paper that nobody's interested in, even if it makes no sense that they aren't.

As an old commercial paper seller, I can tell you that it is ridiculous that the companies with the best balance sheets can't access this market. That's why I think it is important to see that the only paper the Fed is buying is from top-rated companies. We need to take funding problems for the best companies off the table.

Of course, this does nothing for the companies under stress -- like the autos -- that use commercial paper.

And it is not clear, but it would be important if banks like Goldman Sachs (GS Quote - Cramer on GS - Stock Picks) can issue commercial paper and sell it to the Fed. We could use that, too.

But it is the finance model, the GE finance model, that this really helps. It is worth pointing it out because, again, anything that takes the Great Depression off the table -- including the ability for finance companies to, well, finance -- is very important. That means Honeywell (HON Quote - Cramer on HON - Stock Picks), Eaton (ETN Quote - Cramer on ETN - Stock Picks), Parker-Hannifin (PH Quote - Cramer on PH - Stock Picks), United Tech (UTX Quote - Cramer on UTX - Stock Picks) all should be doing better here, as well as Caterpillar (CAT Quote - Cramer on CAT - Stock Picks) and Deere (DE Quote - Cramer on DE - Stock Picks), which have an ability to issue. Remember, GM (GM Quote - Cramer on GM - Stock Picks) and Ford (F Quote - Cramer on F - Stock Picks) are not top-rated, so I don't know if the government will bend the rules for them.

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