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HomeInvestmentsCatching up With Fortune’s 10 Best Stocks for 2011

Catching up With Fortune’s 10 Best Stocks for 2011

I never understand why money magazine, cnbc, fortune, etc., do not call out so-called experts when their stock picks are completely off.  I think it would be both entertaining and educational.  So when I came across an old Fortune Magazine today and saw the article, 10 Best Stocks for 2011, I wanted to see how the so-called best picks were doing 4 months into the new year.

Fortune provides a reasoning for each stock, but I think that is less important for the post rather than just pure returns, however, as a group Fortune mentions,

Our selections this year are slanted toward commodities…protection against a falling dollar…some contrarian selections, including one house-related stock

Fortune Magazine’s Top 10 Stock Picks

Agrium

  • YTD Is up 1.05%

Apple

  • YTD is up 6.82%

Dow Chemical

  • YTD is up 11.04%

East West Bankcorp

  • YTD is up 14.02%

Entropic Communications

  • YTD down 33%
  • To be (kind of) fair the article mentioned this pick as a boom or bust…

Lennar

  • YTD down 2.35%

Mosaic

  • YTD is up 5.25%

Royal Caribbean Cruises

  • YTD down 13.13%

Royal Dutch Shell

  • YTD is up 9.79%

Transocean

  • YTD is up 13.39%

If you were to invest $100 in each of the 10 stocks your portfolio would have been up $12 or 1.2% (not counting fees).  Not a great return considering the S&P is up over 6%.

I am not sure 4 months is a fair representation but I will absolutely come back to this post in a couple months to see how the “experts” are doing.

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14 COMMENTS

  1. I always wonder how posting these picks affects the stock price in and of itself. I always feel like, if it’s been spotlighted by a major magazine, I’ve already missed the boat on a stock. But I always wonder how many people out there buy a stock just because someone famous/a magazine tells them too. Hopefully not enough to impact the stock price!

    • I have those same thoughts – like if I were a writer for fortune and I thought these stocks were going to grow by 30% why the hell would I tell anyone?!

  2. Just curious if Fortune liked each one of these stocks equally or liked specific stocks more than others?

    If they liked them all equally, they have a long way to go to catch the S&p 500!

  3. With all the news and business stations and outlets, there is a need to fill them with information. I am always a little suspicious of recommendations, because it is so public and I don’t know their motivation. I prefer to do my own research on investments because of that. If I screw up, I can only blame myself.

  4. I did have a pretty substantial (for me) investment in RIG up until Jan 2011. I purchased it near $48 and sold near $80. I figured it was severely undervalued, and even though it goes against my investment thesis I felt it was a no-brainer. Glad I got in and out.

    Of those stocks listed the only one I might purchase in the (near) future is RDS. Our need for energy isn’t going to go away anytime soon and they pay a pretty nice dividend in the mean time.

    • Nice work on RIG! A 40% gain for anyone is bad ass. How did you come accross the stock to figure it was undervalued?

      • Well, the P/E ratio at the time was somewhere just north of 5. It was pretty insane. They lost 1 rig out of the entire fleet, and it was insured. That isn’t going to halve their market value. They were in talks for a long time to pay a dividend until it was axed by the Swiss courts. It was a risky play that went against my investment thesis, but I felt that I wasn’t going to lose money, and in fact faced a severe upside. Be fearful when others are greedy and greedy when others are fearful.

  5. this is why i stopped picking a long time ago, with the exception of a handful of stocks (i always leave x% for speculation). what i found is that still enjoy a blended 14%+ return year over year, without the headache and distraction. that said i always wished i had bought apple years ago

    • blended 14% return? Where the hell are you getting that…if you picked up the S&P index for the last decade you are near 0…

  6. good question and i should have added more color. i have a good sum in overseas markets (india primarily which has been on a tear). there is foreign currency risk, but so far that has favored me as the rupee has gained significant traction against the dollar given the country’s growth economically. i also have a sum invested with a hedge fund that a friend has been running for 8+ years now. the foreign funds are in various indexes, but the hedge fund is essentially a stock picking game. so although i don’t personally pick, i guess you could say that someone else does on my behalf for a percentage of my portfolio.

  7. Mosaic, Dow and Agrium seem to be favorites with the large full-service brokers. I talk markets and stocks with a colleague that uses on the big ones, and these three are featured prominently, along with Dryships, Las Vegas Sands and GM. Following stock pick advice from the major mainstream financial media like Fortune, Smart Money Etc might leave your portfolio looking sad.

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