Cramer's Take on Headline Stocks: Feb. 8
Finance Professor Scott Rothbort will be answering questions on Stockpickr Answers on Monday, Feb. 8. Ask away!
NEW YORK (
) -- Regardless of why a stock is in the news, it never hurts to hear what a professional investor has to say about it. The key is to gather as much information as you can in order to make the most informed investment decisions you can. As Jim Cramer (read an excerpt from his
) often reminds, investors must do their homework.
So what has Cramer had to say lately about today's headline-makers? At Stockpickr, we've combed through his recent
RealMoney
blog posts, "Mad Money" TV show recaps and "Stop Trading!" segments to find out
what he thinks about some of today's newsworthy stocks
.
CVS Caremark
(CVS) - Get Report
:
a record $1.05 million, or 74 cents a share, in the fourth quarter, compared with 65 cents a share a year ago.
In his
show on Friday, Cramer said he'd be watching CVS on Monday for signs of a turnaround at the company. Cramer said positive news could turn him positive on the stock.
Toyota Motor
(TM) - Get Report
: Toyota said over the weekend that it would soon release plans to deal with brake problems in its
.
On Friday's
segment, Cramer called Toyota a "battleground stock" and said he preferred Ford, which is said is "going like gangbusters." "Ford is back," Cramer said.
In a Feb. 4 post to his
RealMoney
blog,
:
"Toyota could have handled this in a way that I think we would not have even noticed. Of course, now it is all we can talk about and I think that Ford is simply going to roll all over Toyota and I am reiterating that Ford will be the biggest car company in the world in five years."
And in a Feb. 3 blog post,
that "the 'Cash for Clunkers' month was the slowest in the last three months for Ford, and that's before the recall (which, by the way, is going to be far more crushing to Toyota than people realize ... unless they own one of the recalled cars, as I do.)"
Airgas
(ARG)
: KeyBanc downgraded Airgas to hold from buy.
In a Feb. 5 blog post,
:
"I am in disbelief that
Air Products
(APD) - Get Report
is making a
for Airgas. I am very fond of both companies but rarely have two high-performance well-run companies had to duke it out. I think that the merger is uncompetitive and should be blocked. More importantly, Peter McCausland, who has been on my show more than any other CEO, has made fortunes for his investors. Hate to see him and his company go."
Exxon Mobil
(XOM) - Get Report
: Collins Stewart
upgraded Exxon
to buy from hold with an $80 price target.
On Feb. 5,
on his blog:
"It's amusing to see the bears on the parade grounds, ignoring the household survey number -- so important, the most important of the payroll figures -- and now strutting around with the oil futures, making a phenomenal bear case based on $70 not holding.
"To which I say, we have been there before, and these stocks are starting to get cheap, cheap, cheap. Now, I am not just speaking of natural gas, which has taken a real beating in the press and seems to be pilloried constantly in part because the president is so obviously anti-natural-gas he can't even utter the two words together. I am talking about the integrated oils and the large drilling- services companies, because these companies should not trade on every tick of the futures as they do.
"Of course, it doesn't matter right now. Cash flow, dividends and prospects mean nothing in this tape. I would just caution the negative people that oil is a funny commodity -- the actual industry folk pay no attention to the day-to-day at all. It is meaningless to them. It is only meaningful to the ETF and equity traders who are obsessed with it. I am obsessed with it, too, obsessed as in, we sold
BP
(BP) - Get Report
for
in the high $50s, and as it gets toward 7% yield, I want in and want in bad.
"I am obsessed with it, in that I like
Weatherford
(WFT) - Get Report
so much, and I want to buy more
Chevron
(CVX) - Get Report
and
Marathon
(MRO) - Get Report
, because the demand is there. I am obsessed with it, because the biggest values in the market are in oil here. Not in tech, as they were just 10 days ago.
"Not everything is right on your screen. Oil sure isn't. Both the stocks and the futures.
"It may be the best place to be, especially if oil breaks $70 and we get the big freakout in the stocks as everyone presumes that they are sitting there at Exxon Mobil in panic that the futures trade at $68."
For more of what Cramer's had to say lately about stocks in the news, check out the
portfolio.
RELATED LINKS:
>>Dividend Stocks for the Week
>>Jim Cramer's Portfolios of the Week
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(Editor's note: At the time of this publication, Cramer owned Chevron and Marathon Oil for his Action Alerts PLUS charitable trust.)