Stocks Investors Can Cling To In a Troubled Market
Stocks are tanking again. Investors are worried about a recession. And even the promise of
more Fed rate cuts and a big banking merger aren't helping.
What to do?
"One needs for the moment to just focus on the indices and maybe get a little technical in one's analysis about what stocks to play in a specific sector," suggested Marty Cunningham of Hudson Securities. "But it's not going to get any easier."
Indeed, while investing approaches differ, the one thing everyone agrees on is exactly that: It won't get easier.
So CNBC asked the pros for their investing advice in this kind of market. Here's a sampling of what they had to say.
Small Cap Opportunities
“We’re looking at places where we can sort of hide from a slowdown in the general economy, so we’re looking at new life sciences technologies, we’ve been looking at a growth of organic and energy type of foods and beverages, and we’ve been looking at green sustainable energy projects.”
Erick Ross recommends: Sangamo , Cree , Hansen Natural and Itron
Eric Ross, Canaccord Adams Director of U.S. Equity Research
Investing Against the Grain
“In the U.S., a company like Pfizer is much cheaper than a Novartis or a Sanofi-Aventis. Eli Lilly has moved up recently, but we would be buying that on weakness. We’re finding some smaller caps; everyone’s avoiding the smaller-type stocks and buying the large caps. For the first time in two years, we’re finding some smaller caps that really look interesting, and I still think there are areas in technology.”
Alan Lancz, Alan B. Lancz & Assoc. President
Investing in Real Estate
“Sun Hung Kai is one of our top holdings in the fund. It was a star in 2007, up over 80%, but we still think there are great prospects there. We get caught up in what’s going on here in the U.S. in a slowing economy, but the fact of the matter is, in China and Hong Kong things are still quite dynamic.”
Ritson Ferguson, ING Global Real Estate Fund Manager