5 Best Performing Stocks To Invest In 2017

Stream this: Netflix (NFLX) has gained nearly 20% today following its earnings release last night, making it the top-performing stock in the S&P 500 today.

Bloomberg News

And it wasn’t even close. Netflix jumped 19% to $118.79 today, well ahead of the S&P 500′s 0.6% gain. The second-best best performer? Harley Davidson (HOG), which gained 9% to $$54.16.

Netflix reported a profit 12 cents a share on sales of $2.29 billion, beating forecasts for a profit of 6 cents on sales of $2.28 billion.

Citigroup’s Mark May and Kenneth Dorell call the results “better than feared,” to which we say “duh.” They offer two reasons for Netflix’s surge:

Following a disappointing 2Q report (including 3Q guidance below forecasts), Netflix reported 3Q16 results and issued 4Q16 guidance above these lowered expectations. While subscriber net adds remain below year-ago levels and cash burn (including content spend) remains high, revenue growth accelerated to 32% (vs. 28% in 2Q) on subscriber growth of 25% (vs. 27% in 2Q) as the recent price increases benefited growth. We believe the stock��s reaction in the aftermarket may be due to a combination of 1) the set-up and negative sentiment heading into the quarter; and, 2) investors rewarding Netflix��s pricing power, as price increases proved not to have an outsized impact on churn.

5 Best Performing Stocks To Invest In 2017: Alexion Pharmaceuticals, Inc.(ALXN)

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By Ben Levisohn]

  With biotech stocks like Alexion Pharmaceuticals (ALXN), Biogen (BIIB), Amgen (AMGN), Celgene (CELG) and Gilead Sciences (GILD) getting pounded following Britain’s decision to embrace the Brexit, Piper Jaffray’s Joshua Schimmer and team assess the damage:

  Bloomberg News

  Amid the broader sell-off, we continue to assess the impact of Brexit on our coverage universe. Overall, the direct UK impact on our large-cap coverage appears minimal on each company’s operations, though the broader volatility continues to weigh on the sector.�Alexion Pharmaceuticals remains a top large-cap pick at these levels and view the recent sell-off and today’s ~9% move as an overreaction and would take advantage of the weakness. That said, we are entering unknown territory and it’s not certain if Britain becomes isolated and the EU ultimately unites around this (which is what we suspect will happen), or whether this is just the first in a series of dominoes that fragments the EU….

  No immediate impact on operations: Immediate operations are not expected to be affected as the UK is not leaving immediately. Longer term is anyone’s guess, though we note that all the EU countries have always controlled their own reimbursement process, which is often a gating step in the process. That said, if the UK’s economy is negatively impacted this may negatively impact UK reimbursement decisions. Some companies like�Gilead Sciences noted that the UK could be treated as non-EU countries, such as Switzerland and Turkey which would not be a major change…

  Currency probably the biggest impact: While UK sales are generally minimal for individual companies, broader European exposure varies widely for each of our large-cap companies, with�Celgene and�Alexion Pharmaceuticals seeing the highest exposure followed by Amgen, Gilead Sciences, Incyte (INCY) and BioMarin Pharmaceutical (BMRN), and�Biogen least so.

  Shares of Alexi

• [By David Sterman]

  Growth-oriented investors should also check out Alexion Pharmaceuticals (Nasdaq: ALXN(link is external)), which falls through the cracks between the massive well-established biotechs, and the small-cap biotechs that are still pre-revenue.

  Alexion targets rare and severe diseases, and has built a broad platform of drugs to treat them. Sales growth has never been less than 37% at any point in the past eight years, and 20% to 25% growth appears locked in over coming years as well. Analysts at UBS, who see 30% upside to their $202 price target, believe that a healthy drug pipeline provides multiple catalysts this year in the form of clinical trial updates. They suggest that shares would be worth $230 in a buyout scenario. 

• [By Cameron Saucier]

  Worst-Performing S&P 500 Stocks No. 5: Alexion Pharmaceuticals Inc. (Nasdaq: ALXN)

  Alexion develops drugs for rare disorders and diseases, like hemoglobinuria.

• [By Ben Levisohn]

  Jefferies analyst Brian Abrahams and team offer five reasons a Gilead Sciences (GILD) takeover of Alexion Pharmaceuticals (ALXN) makes sense…and four reasons it doesn’t:

• [By Ben Levisohn]

  Long-Term Bucket��Buy and hold; we consider these to be high-quality names that we see outperforming the group both in the current market and longer term: Celgene (CELG), Alexion Pharmaceuticals (ALXN), Jazz Pharmaceuticals (JAZZ).

5 Best Performing Stocks To Invest In 2017: Grifols, S.A.(GRFS)

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By Monica Wolfe]

  Grifols SA (GRFS)

  Paulson��s fourth largest holding is in Grifols SA where he holds on to 19,786,279 shares of the company��s stock. His position in the company represents 4% of his total portfolio and 5.76% of the company��s shares outstanding.

5 Best Performing Stocks To Invest In 2017: SORL Auto Parts Inc.(SORL)

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By Monica Gerson]

  Sorl Auto Parts, Inc. (NASDAQ: SORL) is expected to post its quarterly earnings at $0.20 per share on revenue of $55.35 million.

  Clean Diesel Technologies, Inc. (NASDAQ: CDTI) is projected to post a quarterly loss at $0.18 per share on revenue of $10.25 million.

• [By Lisa Levin]

  Sorl Auto Parts, Inc. (NASDAQ: SORL) was down, falling around 8 percent to $3.68. Greenridge Global downgraded SORL Auto Parts from Buy to Hold.

5 Best Performing Stocks To Invest In 2017: C.H. Robinson Worldwide, Inc.(CHRW)

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By Lisa Levin]

  Shares of C.H. Robinson Worldwide, Inc. (NASDAQ: CHRW) were down 4 percent to $71.69. UBS downgraded C.H. Robinson Worldwide from Neutral to Sell.

• [By Chad Tracy]

  As it's known today, C.H. Robinson (Nasdaq: CHRW) has again changed with the times.

  Unlike transportation industry titans FedEx (NYSE: FDX) or UPS (NYSE: UPS), C.H. Robinson does not own a fleet of trucks that transport goods. Instead, it specializes in logistics. Other companies hire C.H. Robinson to make their transportation services more efficient.

• [By Gary Jakacky]

  Only one company convincingly jumped thru all the hoops: C.H. Robinson Worldwide, Inc. (CHRW).

  If only one of the companies in IYT appear to be undervalued, it might give you pause about how brightly the ETF will shine in the very near future.

5 Best Performing Stocks To Invest In 2017: BlackBerry Limited(BBRY)

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By Alex Dumortier, CFA]

  This Berry is bleeding fast
  Twice over the course of the last six weeks, I warned investors away from BlackBerry (NASDAQ: BBRY  ) shares. On Sep. 4, I wrote:

• [By WWW.DAILYFINANCE.COM]

  AP TORONTO -- BlackBerry (BBRY) said Friday that it will lay off 4,500 employees, or 40 percent of its global workforce, as it reports a nearly $1 billion second-quarter loss a week earlier than expected. The stock dropped 23 percent to $8.11 after reopening for trading. Shares had been halted earlier pending the news. BlackBerry had been scheduled to release earnings next week. But the Canadian company said late Friday afternoon that it expects to post a staggering loss of $950 million to $995 million for the quarter, including a massive write down of the value of its inventory due to increasing competition. Revenue of $1.6 billion is only about half of the $3 billion that analysts expected, according to FactSet. The company's expected adjusted loss of 47 cents to 51 cents per share falls far below the loss of 16 cents per share projected by Wall Street. BlackBerry said it wants to slash operating costs in half by the first quarter of 2015 so cutting its global headcount to 7,000 total employees is necessary. "We are implementing the difficult, but necessary operational changes announced today to address our position in a maturing and more competitive industry, and to drive the company toward profitability," Thorsten Heins, President and CEO of BlackBerry, said in a statement. The BlackBerry, pioneered in 1999, was the dominant smartphone for on-the-go business people and other customers before Apple debuted the iPhone in 2007. Since then, BlackBerry Ltd. has been hammered by competition from the iPhone as well as Android-based rivals like Samsung. In January, the company unveiled new phones running a revamped operating system called BlackBerry 10. The Z10 and Q10 were designed to better compete for customers and rejuvenate the brand. But vendor marketing was uneven and BlackBerry's market share continues to lag its rivals. BlackBerry said last month that it would consider selling itself. The Waterloo, Ontario-based company reiterated Friday that a sp

• [By Victor Mora]

  BlackBerry provides innovative wireless communication products to consumers and companies worldwide. The company is rolling out new products despite the uncertainty of recent releases. The stock has not done very well as of late and is currently trading sideways as it attempts to establish value. Over the last four quarters, investors have not been pleased, as earnings and revenues have mostly been decreasing. Relative to its peers and sector, BlackBerry has been a weak year-to-date performer. WAIT AND SEE what BlackBerry does this coming quarter.

• [By Lisa Levin]

  
  Benzinga's newsdesk monitors options activity to notice unusual patterns. These large volume (and often out of the money) trades were initially published intraday in Benzinga Professional . These trades were placed during Monday's regular session.

  United Natural Foods, Inc. (NASDAQ: UNFI) Jul16 40.0 Calls: 900 @ ASK $1.85: 2042 traded vs 24 OI: $39.15 Ref BlackBerry Ltd (NASDAQ: BBRY) Aug16 8.0 Calls: 4000 @ ASK $0.27: 4028 traded vs 595 OI: Earnings 6/23 Before Open $7.38 Ref Starbucks Corporation (NASDAQ: SBUX) Fri 7/22 $56.0 Calls (Wkly) Sweep: 967 @ ASK $1.31: 7682 traded vs 44 OI: Earnings 7/28 $55.21 Ref MGM Resorts International (NYSE: MGM) Jun16 25.0 Calls: 813 @ ASK $0.21: 11k traded vs 2719 OI: $24.01 Ref Eagle Pharmaceuticals Inc (NASDAQ: EGRX) Jul16 40.0 Calls: 500 @ Above Ask! $8.30: 500 traded vs 0 OI: $41.88 Ref

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