New Highs

New Highs

Today I’m going to go over a simple screen with a powerful concept.

Buying stocks making new highs. (And yes, there are indeed stocks making news highs right now.)

I know some are reluctant to buy stocks making new 52 weeks highs. If you’re one of them, have you ever asked yourself why?

If a stock is making a new 52-week high, that’s a good thing. Especially now.

I’m pretty sure that a person who dislikes buying stocks making new
52-weeks highs wouldn’t be too upset if the stock he already owned broke out to new 52-week highs.

And why should he? Statistics have shown that stocks making new highs have a tendency of making even higher highs.

These are the stocks we all dream about. Get in and it keeps going up.

Of course the fundamentals need to be there. And you should keep a watchful eye on valuations. But if you were in a stock making new highs and cheering it on, it seems silly to be afraid of one doing the same just because you haven’t bought it.

One question I like asking myself just to put things into perspective is: if I was in it, would I be excited and would I still want to be in it? If the answer is yes, then I’ll look for the best opportunity to get in.

If the answer is no, that I’d want to take profits, then I’ll move on.

This topic actually reminds me of a question someone asked me a while ago about a stock I was talking about that was at a new 52-week high. In fact, it was at a new 5 year high.

He said aren’t you worried about buying a stocks at a 52-week high? I said of course not. So it just made a new-52 week high. That’s great news. Guess what -- last year it made a new 52-week high as well. And the year before that. And the year before that.

Can you imagine all the money you’d be leaving on the table if you were afraid of being in stocks every time they made a new high?

The screen I’m running today looks for:

• Stock trading within 10% of their 52 week high. The expression looks like this:

Current Price/52 Week high >= .90

That means these stocks are either at a new 52 week high, or have
just hit it and still trading within 10% of it, or are climbing towards their 52 week high and are within striking distance.

• Zacks Rank <= 2

Only Zacks Strong Buys and Buys.

• Price to Sales <= 1

A Price to Sales ratio of 1 means you’re paying $1 for every $1 of sales a company makes. A P/S ratio of less than 1 means you’re paying less than $1 for every $1 of sales a company makes. I have found that by looking at stocks with a P/S ratio of <=1 helps me find stocks that are still considered undervalued -– even if they are making new highs.

• Current Avg. 20 Day Volume > Previous week’s Avg. 20 Day Volume

In short, this helps me find stocks where the volume has increased in the recent week vs. the previous week. If the price is climbing on increased volume, that shows increased demand or buying coming in. And the more buying demand there is for a stock, the more it should climb.

• All of these parameters are applied to stocks >= $5 with Avg. daily volume of >= 100,000.

Here’s 5 stocks that made it thru this week’s screen for 8/16/11:

HPY - Snapshot Report  Heartland Payments
LGF - Analyst Report  Lion’s Gate
RDEN - Snapshot Report  Elizabeth Arden
RRGB - Analyst Report  Red Robin Gourmet
QLTY - Snapshot Report  Quality Distribution

Sign up now for your 2 week free trial to the Research Wizard and get the rest of the stocks on this list and start using this screen in your own trading. Or create your own strategies and test them first before you invest. Know what to buy and when to sell. You can do it.

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Disclosure: Officers, directors and/or employees of Zacks Investment Research may own or have sold short securities and/or hold long and/or short positions in options that are mentioned in this material. An affiliated investment advisory firm may own or have sold short securities and/or hold long and/or short positions in options that are mentioned in this material.

Read the full analyst report on QLTY

Read the full analyst report on RDEN

Read the full analyst report on LGF

Read the full analyst report on RRGB

Read the full analyst report on HPY