Barron's Roundtable Picks for 2009

Two professional stockpickers on the Barron's roundtable picked 10 stocks and exchange traded funds (ETFs) for 2009. Some of these picks were questioned by other members of the 10-person panel who will disclose their picks in the next two issues of Barron's.

Since most of the panelists are very bearish on the market for the next five to six years or more, all of these picks probably will face strong resistance to significant rallies. Since these picks all are depressed, if they do rally, they will face selling by current owners who will be trying to cut their losses on the upticks, which, again will make a good rally difficult. Often, stocks picked in the Barron's roundtable go up on the Monday after they're announced and then settle down for awhile. It will be interesting to see what they do today.

Picks by Meryl Witmer, general partner, Eagle Capital Partners, New York:

• Kaiser Aluminum Corp. (KALU), $22.32.
• Allegheny Energy Inc. (AYE), $33.32.
• Assurant Inc. (AIZ) $30.15.
• Discover Financial Inc. (DFS) $8.71.

Picks by Fred Hickey, editor, The High-Tech Strategist, Nashua, N.H.:

• Microsoft (MSFT) $19.52.
• Cadence Design Systems (CDNS) $4.29.
• Mkt. Vectors Gold Miners ETF (GDX) $31.31.
• Agnico-Eale Mines (AEM) $49.52.
• PowerShares DB Agriculture ETF (DBA) $26.45.
• iShares FTSE/Xinhua China 25 Index ETF (FXI) $27.71.

Daily charts for 10 of the picks are here. Click on a chart to see a gallery of charts. It is important to look at weekly and point and figure charts as well as the daily charts. As last week's market action showed, bullish charts don't always mean stocks will keeping up. Seeking Alpha provides another summary of the Barron's roundtable here.

Disclosure: I don’t own any of these picks.

Comments

[User 68127:]

Meryl is by far the smartest member of the RoundTable. She is about the only whose opinion is worth anything. Scott Black is OK too.

Other than that, they are just a bunch of self-important windbags using the RoundTable Forum to tout their, or their firm's positions and burnish their reputations among those readers who don't bother to check back on their results.

Jan 12 02:35 PM