Cramer: Dangerous Debt

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Overleveraged. Too much debt. Need to pay down debt. How many times have you read that story?

You read it so much because it plays out every day and plays havoc with stock picking almost every time you see a savory stock down on its luck.

This weekend, as I went through the charts, I was amazed at how low some stocks have gone, stocks that I would normally say to just take a flyer on, but turn out to have so much debt, short- and long-term, that they are just too dangerous.

Consider these perhaps poisonous morsels:

International Paper(IP Quote) -- Best-of-breed paper company with a 9.3% yield, but $11 billion in debt that has been endlessly piled on. How can that yield be sustainable?

Tyson Foods (TSN Quote) -- We know that prices for grain are way down. Grain is the principal cost of this company. But it has $2.8 billion in long-term debt and that's just too much to make it attractive.

Newell-Rubbermaid(NWL Quote) -- This once-great company's got a yield of 9.7%. How much do I want that? But how much do I want that $2.2 billion in debt on the balance sheet? Like a hole in the head!

Legg Mason(LM Quote) -- With its 5.3% yield and a brand name that must still hold some cachet, you would like to snap it up until you realize that the company's got about $3 billion in long-term debt. How can that company compete with T. Rowe Price (TROW Quote), which has no debt?