By Sol Palha:

Traders should not base their investment decision on yield alone but examine some of the key metrics described below. In most cases, higher yields are associated with a higher degree of risk. It is okay to deploy some capital into riskier plays but betting the house is asking for trouble.

Debt to Equity Ratio is found by dividing the company’s total amount of long-term debt (debts with interest rates that have a maturity longer than one year) by the total amount of equity. A debt to equity ratio of 0.5 tells us that the company is using 50 cents of liabilities in addition to each $1 dollar of shareholders equity in the business. There is no fixed ideal number as it depends on the industry the company is in. However, in general a ratio under 1 is acceptable and ideally it should be in the 0.5-0.6 ranges.

Current Ratio is

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By Kapitall:

Do you think the stock market is in for a new bout of volatility? If so, you may be interested in this list.

We ran a screen on the biotech industry for stocks with high liquidity, measured by current ratios above 3. Because biotech companies often operate for expanded periods of time without producing revenues, they rely heavily on sources of liquidity to continue operations. Therefore companies with high liquidity are viewed as safer investments.

After screening for liquidity, we searched for stocks with high correlations to the Volatility Index (VIX) over the last two months, indicating that these stocks tend to perform well during times of market anxiety and uncertainty.

‪Interactive Chart: Press Play to compare changes in analyst ratings over the last two years for the stocks mentioned below. Analyst ratings sourced from Zacks Investment Research.‬

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We also created a price-weighted index

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CR Bard (BCR)

Q4 2011 Earnings Call

January 31, 2012 5:00 pm ET

Executives

Timothy M. Ring – Chairman, Chief Executive Officer and Chairman of Executive Committee

John H. Weiland – President, Chief Operating Officer and Director

Todd C. Schermerhorn – Chief Financial Officer and Senior Vice President

John A. DeFord – Senior Vice President of Science Technology & Clinical Affairs

Analysts

Lawrence S. Keusch – Morgan Keegan & Company, Inc., Research Division

Brooks E. West – Piper Jaffray Companies, Research Division

Jonathan J. Palmer – Credit Agricole Securities (USA) Inc., Research Division

David R. Lewis – Morgan Stanley, Research Division

Matthew Taylor – Barclays Capital, Research Division

Michael Matson – Mizuho Securities USA Inc., Research Division

Michael N. Weinstein – JP Morgan Chase & Co, Research Division

Miroslava Minkova – Leerink Swann LLC, Research Division

Kristen M. Stewart – Deutsche Bank AG, Research Division

Topher Orr – Goldman Sachs

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By Turnkey Analyst:

Last week, The Procter & Gamble Company (PG) announced that it had a difficult quarter due to a weak economic environment. Although Fortune magazine in 2011 ranked PG in fifth place for its “Most Admired Companies” list, PG shares are down in 2012, even as the major stock indexes have rallied. Recognizing that one should always be on the lookout for an opportunity to buy one of the world’s great collections of brands, we at Turnkey Analyst decided to run the company through our rigorous, academically-tested quantitative screening and evaluation processes to see what the numbers have to tell us, given PG’s recent pullback.

PG is the largest branded consumer packaged goods company in the world, and boasts two dozen billion dollar brands. The firm is organized into three Global Business Units, Beauty, Health and Well-Being, and Household Care, which are responsible for brand strategy. Its products are sold through

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Medical Properties Trust, Inc. (MPW)

Q4 2011 Earnings Call

January 31, 2012 4:30 p.m. ET

Executives

Edward K. Aldag, Jr. – Chairman, President and Chief Executive Officer

R. Steven Hamner – Executive Vice President & Chief Financial Officer

Emmett E. McLean – Executive Vice President & Chief Operating Officer

Charles Lambert – Finance Director

Rosa Hooper – Director of Underwriting and Asset Management

Thomas W. Schultz – Director of Healthcare Policy

Presentation

Good day, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the Fourth Quarter 2011 Medical Properties Trust Earnings Conference Call. My name is [Carez], and I will be your coordinator for today. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode and will remain muted for the duration of the call. (Operator Instructions) As a reminder, this call is being recorded for replay purposes.

And I would now like to hand the call over to your host for the

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By Adam Muller:

I believe Darling International (DAR) is a compelling long idea for several reasons. Investors have yet to give the company full credit for their 2010 acquisition of Griffin industries. In addition, DAR’s current valuation also does not include the significant positive impact of its joint venture with Valero to construct a biodiesel facility co-located with one of Valero’s refineries.

In their most recent 10-Q filing, DAR describes itself as follows:

The Company is a leading provider of rendering, cooking oil and bakery waste recycling and recovery solutions to the nation’s food industry. The Company collects and recycles animal by-products, bakery waste and used cooking oil from poultry and meat processors, commercial bakeries, grocery stores, butcher shops, and food service establishments and provides grease trap cleaning services to many of the same establishments.

Acquisition of Griffin Industries

DAR closed on its acquisition of private rending company Griffin Industries in December 2010.

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SL Green Realty (SLG)

Q4 2011 Earnings Call

January 31, 2012 10:00 am ET

Executives

Heidi Gillette – Director of Investor Relations

Marc Holliday – Chief Executive Officer, Director and Member of Executive Committee

Matt DiLiberto –

Steven M. Durels – Executive Vice President and Director of Leasing

James E. Mead – Chief Financial Officer

Analysts

Alexander David Goldfarb – Sandler O’Neill + Partners, L.P., Research Division

Anthony Paolone – JP Morgan Chase & Co, Research Division

Nicholas Yulico – Macquarie Research

James C. Feldman – BofA Merrill Lynch, Research Division

Steve Sakwa – ISI Group Inc., Research Division

Sheila McGrath – Keefe, Bruyette, & Woods, Inc., Research Division

Michael Knott – Green Street Advisors, Inc., Research Division

Brendan Maiorana – Wells Fargo Securities, LLC, Research Division

Joshua Attie – Citigroup Inc, Research Division

Michael Bilerman – Citigroup Inc, Research Division

Louise Pitt – Goldman Sachs Group Inc., Research Division

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By Tom Brown:

Did you notice this little detail in the expansion of the HAMP loan modification program the Treasury Department announced last week?:

. . . Treasury will expand eligibility to include properties that are currently occupied by a tenant as well as vacant properties which the borrower intends to rent. This will provide critical relief to both homeowners that live in their homes and those who rent their homes, while further stabilizing communities from the blight of vacant and foreclosed properties. Single family homes are an important source of affordable rental housing, and foreclosure of investor-owned homes has disproportionate negative effects on low- and moderate-income renters. [Emph. added]

Seriously? So now the federal government proposes to provide relief not just to owner-occupiers, but to investors whose gambles have gone bad, too? As a taxpayer, why should their problems be any of my business? They took a risk—and they lost. These are

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By Stephen Simpson:

Investors should always be a little leery of seeing too much love and praise for their holdings; having a few skeptics left to convince leaves some upside. Although Hologic (HOLX) shares have come up nicely in the past quarter, there is still a lot of growth potential in the earnings and in the stock.

Beat, Raise, Rinse, Repeat

Hologic has established a decent track record of slightly outperforming expectations and this fiscal first quarter continued that trend. Revenue rose a little more than 9% this quarter, slightly topping the average guess, as the company logged 10% or better sales growth in its breast health, diagnostics, and skeletal businesses. GYN Surgical was the laggard, with less than 4% growth over last year.

Profits were a little more mixed. Gross margin was up a bit (about 50 basis points), but the company’s expected increase in SG&A spending to support the tomo rollout

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By Scott Matusow:

MannKind Corporation (MNKD) is a biopharmaceutical company that focuses on the discovery, development and commercialization of therapeutic products for diabetes and cancer in the United States, Europe and Asia. Its lead product candidate, AFREZZA Inhalation Powder, an ultra rapid-acting insulin that is in Phase III clinical trials for the treatment of diabetes for the control of hyperglycemia. The company also develops MKC1106-MT, an investigational cancer immunotherapy product, which is in Phase II clinical trials for the treatment of adults with type 1 or type 2 diabetes, and MKC204, which is in preclinical development stage for the treatment of malignancies and inflammatory diseases.

In addition, its products include MKC253 (GLP-1), a Phase I clinical trials product for the treatment of type 2 diabetes; MKC1106-PP, a Phase I clinical trials product for diverse tumor types, metastatic disease, and/or progressive and refractory disease; and MKC180, an obesity compound and MKC1106-NS, a cancer immunotherapy

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