Top 5 Promising Stocks For 2014

Avago Technologies (AVGO) has made a good comeback. The company, despite seeing weakness all through the year, posted fantastic results. The company�� good results make it a promising investment. The operational efficiencies led Avago to see a good 20% growth in its top line. But looking at the ratios, the company is still expensive with a trailing P/E of 29. Also, the decline in the dividend yield to 1.70% might scare a few investors away.

Moreover, the stock is trading close to its 52-week high. Avago, being associated with some of the top companies such as Apple and Samsung, is confident about a solid performance in the future. With the growing mobile segment and Avago being a solid player in it, it has bright opportunities to hit gold in the future.

Avago�� wireless communication business should prove to be a primary growth driver for the company. So, with the growing traction of Apple�� iPhone, Avago is expecting to benefit. Also, in the past, despite weakness in Apple's iPhone production, Avago has managed to increase its wireless revenue. Avago sees bright opportunities in association with Apple and Samsung.

5 Best Restaurant Stocks To Buy For 2015: Sonde Resources Corp (SOQ)

Sonde Resources Corp. (Sonde) is engaged in the exploration for, and acquisition, development and production of, petroleum and natural gas with operations in Western Canada and North Africa. On June 23, 2011, the Company sold its interests in Block 5(c) and the assumption of certain liabilities in respect of the MG Block through the Niko Sale Agreement. On September 23, 2011, the Company acquired a block of producing and non-producing assets in Drumheller from a third party, which includes the bulk of producing interests in the Mannville I oil pool. On January 1, 2012, the Company amalgamated Seeker Petroleum Ltd., Challenger Energy Corp. and Sonde Resources Trinidad and Tobago Ltd. into Sonde Resources Corp. On February 8, 2012, the Company completed the sale of 26,240 gross undeveloped acres (24,383 net acres) in its Kaybob Duvernay play in Alberta. Advisors' Opinion:

• [By John Udovich]

  While Bakken formation oil and gas stocks have grabbed the attention of�American investors, small cap Alberta or Saskatchewan oil and gas stocks Advantage Oil & Gas Ltd (NYSE: AAV), Sonde Resources Corp (NYSEMKT: SOQ) and up and coming Centor Energy Inc (OTCBB: CNTO) have been largely overlooked as they seek to exploit oil and gas (including oil sands) in the resource rich Canadian provinces of Alberta or Saskatchewan or seek strategic alternatives for their assets in these areas or themselves. It should be mentioned that Canada�� oil reserves are third only to Venezuela and Saudi Arabia with over 95% of these reserves being the oil sands of Alberta plus that province contains much of the country�� conventional oil reserves as well. In addition, the province of Saskatchewan along with offshore areas of Newfoundland contain substantial production and reserves. Excluding oil sands, Alberta would have 39% of Canada�� remaining conventional oil reserves,�followed by�offshore Newfoundland with�28% and Saskatchewan with 27%.

Top 5 Promising Stocks For 2014: Liberty Global Inc. (LBTYK)

Liberty Global, Inc. provides video, broadband Internet, and telephony services primarily in Europe and Chile. The company offers broadband services over cable distribution systems, including video, broadband Internet, and telephony; and video services through direct-to-home satellite, or through multichannel multipoint distribution systems. Its analog video services comprise basic and expanded basic programming; and digital cable services include basic and premium programming, digital video recorders, and high definition programming, as well as pay-per-view programming, such as video-on-demand and near video-on-demand. In addition, the company offers voice-over-Internet-protocol and circuit-switched telephony services, as well as mobile telephony services using third-party networks. Further, it owns programming networks that provide video programming channels to multi-channel distribution systems owned by the company and the third parties. As of December 31, 2011, the com pany owned and operated networks that passed 33,262,100 homes; and served 18,405,500 video subscribers, 8,159,300 broadband Internet subscribers, and 6,225,300 telephony subscribers. Liberty Global, Inc. was founded in 2004 and is based in Englewood, Colorado.

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By Monica Wolfe]

  Liberty Global PLC (LBTYK)

  John Burbank upped his stake by 376.63% during the second quarter. The guru purchased a total of 402,991 shares in the second quarter price range of $64.57 to $73.78, with an estimated average price of $69.23 per share. Since then the price per share has increased approximately 4.9%.

• [By GuruFocus]

  Warren Buffett (Trades, Portfolio) added to his holdings in Liberty Global PLC by 149.19%. His purchase prices were between $40.36 and $45.96, with an estimated average price of $43.34. The impact to his portfolio due to this purchase was 0.17%. His holdings were 7,346,968 shares as of 03/31/2014.

  Added: Liberty Global PLC (LBTYK)

  Warren Buffett (Trades, Portfolio) added to his holdings in Liberty Global PLC by 149.19%. His purchase prices were between $38.905 and $43.46, with an estimated average price of $41.33. The impact to his portfolio due to this purchase was 0.17%. His holdings were 7,346,968 shares as of 03/31/2014.

Top 5 Promising Stocks For 2014: Energy Transfer Partners LP (ETP)

Energy Transfer Partners, L.P. (ETP), incorporated on June 25, 1996, is a limited partnership in the United States engaged in natural gas operations. ETP is managed by its general partner, Energy Transfer Partners GP, L.P. (General Partner or ETP GP), and ETP GP is managed by its general partner, Energy Transfer Partners, L.L.C. (ETP LLC), which is owned by Energy Transfer Equity, L.P., another publicly traded master limited partnership (ETE). The activities in which the Company is engaged all of which are in the United States and the wholly owned operating subsidiaries (collectively the Operating Companies). The Company�� business segments are: intrastate transportation and storage; interstate transportation; midstream, and retail propane, Natural Gas Liquid (NGL) Transportation and Services Segment and other retail propane related operations. In January 2012, AmeriGas Partners, L.P. acquired propane operations (Heritage) of ETP. In October 2012, ETP and Sunoco, Inc. (Sunoco) announced the completion of the merger of a wholly owned subsidiary of ETP, with and into Sunoco, with Sunoco surviving the merger as a subsidiary of ETP. In October 2012, Summit Midstream Partners LP acquired ETC Canyon Pipeline, LLC from La Grange Acquisition, L.P., a wholly owned subsidiary of ETP. In April 2013, Energy Transfer Partners LP acquired the remaining 60% interest in ETP Holdco Corp. Effective December 20, 2013, Algonquin Power & Utilities Corp. (APUC) acquired the Massachusetts natural gas distribution utility assets of Southern Union Company, a wholly owned indirect subsidiary of ETP.

The Company�� natural gas operations includes natural gas midstream and intrastate transportation and storage through La Grange Acquisition, L.P., which conducts business under the assumed name of Energy Transfer Company (ETC OLP); and interstate natural gas transportation services through Energy Transfer Interstate Holdings, LLC (ET Interstate). ET Interstate is the parent company of Transwestern Pipeline Company! , LLC (Transwestern), ETC Fayetteville Express Pipeline, LLC (ETC FEP) and ETC Tiger Pipeline, LLC (ETC Tiger). NGL transportation, storage and fractionation services primarily through Lone Star NGL LLC (Lone Star). Retail propane through Heritage Operating, L.P. (HOLP) and Titan Energy Partners, L.P. (Titan), both of which were contributed to AmeriGas Partners, L.P. (AmeriGas).

Intrastate Transportation and Storage Segment

Through the Company�� intrastate transportation and storage segment, it owns and operates approximately 7,800 miles of natural gas transportation pipelines and three natural gas storage facilities located in the state of Texas. Through ETC OLP, it owns the intrastate pipeline system in the United States with interconnects to Texas markets and to major consumption areas throughout the United States. Its intrastate transportation and storage segment focuses on the transportation of natural gas to major markets from various prolific natural gas producing areas through connections with other pipeline systems, as well as through its Oasis pipeline, its East Texas pipeline, its natural gas pipeline and storage assets that are referred to as ET Fuel System, and its HPL System. The major customers on its intrastate pipelines include Natural Gas Exchange, Inc., EDF Trading North America, Inc., XTO Energy, Inc. and ConocoPhillips.

Interstate Transportation Segment

Through the Company�� interstate transportation segment, it owns and operates approximately 12,600 miles of interstate natural gas pipeline and has a 50% interest in the joint venture that owns the 185-mile Fayetteville Express pipeline. The major customers on its interstate pipelines include Chesapeake Energy Marketing, Inc., EnCana Marketing (USA), Inc. (EnCana), Shell Energy North America (US), L.P. and Pacific Summit Energy LLC.

Midstream Segment

Through the Company�� midstream segment, it owns and operates approximately 6,700 miles of in service natur! al gas ga! thering pipelines, two natural gas processing plants, 15 natural gas treating facilities and 15 natural gas conditioning facilities. Its midstream segment focuses on the gathering, compression, treating, blending, processing and marketing of natural gas, and its operations are concentrated in major producing basins and shales, including the Austin Chalk trend and Eagle Ford Shale in South and Southeast Texas, the Permian Basin in West Texas and New Mexico, the Barnett Shale in North Texas, the Bossier Sands in East Texas, the Uinta and Piceance Basins in Utah and Colorado, the Marcellus Shale in West Virginia, and the Haynesville Shale in East Texas and Louisiana. It markets natural gas on its pipeline systems in addition to other pipeline systems. The major customers on its midstream pipelines include Enterprise Products Partners L.P. (Enterprise) and Chevron Phillips Chemical Company LP.

Natural Gas Liquid (NGL) Transportation and Services Segment

NGL transportation pipelines transport mixed NGLs and other hydrocarbons from natural gas processing facilities to fractionation plants and storage facilities. NGL storage facilities are used for the storage of mixed NGLs, NGL products and petrochemical products owned by third-parties in storage tanks and underground wells, which allow for the injection and withdrawal of such products at various times of the year to meet demand cycles. NGL fractionators separate mixed NGL streams into purity products, such as ethane, propane, normal butane, isobutane and natural gasoline.

Through its NGL transportation and services segment it own and operate approximately 300 miles of NGL pipelines and have a 50% interest in the Liberty pipeline, an approximately 85-mile NGL pipeline. It also have a 70% interest in Lone Star, which owns approximately 2,000 miles of NGL pipelines, three NGL processing plants, two fractionation facilities and NGL storage facilities with aggregate working storage capacity of approximately 47 million Bbls.

!

Re! tail Marketing Segment

The Company�� retail marketing and wholesale distribution business segment consists of Sunoco's marketing operations, which sell gasoline and middle distillates at retail and operates convenience stores in 25 states, primarily on the east coast and in the midwest region of the United States. The highest concentrations of outlets are located in Connecticut, Florida, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, New Jersey, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Virginia.

All Other

ETP owns 100% of the membership interests of Energy Transfer Group, L.L.C. (ETG), which owns all of the partnership interests of Energy Transfer Technologies, Ltd. (ETT). ETT provides compression services to customers engaged in the transportation of natural gas, including its other segments. The Company also owns all of the outstanding equity interests of a natural gas compression equipment business with operations in Arkansas, California, Colorado, Louisiana, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania and Texas.

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By Lisa Levin]

  Susser Holdings (NYSE: SUSS) shares rose 36.54% to $77.87. The volume of Susser Holdings shares traded was 1198% higher than normal. Energy Transfer Partners LP (NYSE: ETP) announced its plans to acquire Susser Holdings in a deal valued at around $1.8 billion.

• [By Paul Quintaro]

  Energy Transfer Equity, L.P. (NYSE: ETE) and Energy Transfer Partners, L.P. (NYSE: ETP) (collectively, ��nergy Transfer�� and BG Group announced today that they have entered into a project development agreement (PDA) to jointly develop the liquefied natural gas (LNG) export project at the existing Trunkline LNG import terminal in Lake Charles, Louisiana.

• [By Aimee Duffy]

  If you are a unitholder in Energy Transfer Partners (NYSE: ETP  ) , you might not even click on this article. A simple fist pump, and you're moving on. But these short pieces can clue you in to what other people are thinking about your investment, potential changes you may need to make to your investment thesis, and how credible the stock-rating organization is.

• [By Arjun Sreekumar]

  Other leading midstream companies, such as Kinder Morgan Energy Partners (NYSE: KMI  ) , Plains All American (NYSE: PAA  ) , and Sunoco Logistics Partners ��now a part of Energy Transfer Partners (NYSE: ETP  ) ��are also working on boosting storage and distribution capacity along the Gulf Coast to handle the influx of crude oil. �

Top 5 Promising Stocks For 2014: Fair Isaac Corp (FICO)

Fair Isaac Corporation (FICO), incorporated on May 15, 1987, provides products and services that enable businesses to automate, improve and connect decisions to enhance business performance. The Company operates in three segments: Applications, which include pre-configured Decision Management applications designed for a specific type of business problem or process; Scores, which includes the Company's business-to-business scoring solutions and services, its myFICO solutions for consumers, and associated professional services, and Tools segment, which include software tools that clients can use to create their own custom Decision Management applications, as well as associated professional services. In May 2012, the Company acquired Entiera Inc. In September 2012, it acquired Adeptra Ltd. On April 1, 2013, FICO acquired Infoglide Software Corp.

Applications

The Company develops industry-tailored Decision Management applications, categorized as Applications, which apply analytics, data management and Decision Management software to specific business challenges and processes. These include credit offer prescreening, insurance claims management and others. The Company's Applications primarily serve clients in the banking, insurance, healthcare, and retail sectors. The chief offerings for marketing are the Company's FICO Analytic Offer Manager and FICO Customer Dialogue Manager. These solutions offer a suite of products, capabilities and services designed to integrate the technology and analytic services needed to perform context-sensitive customer acquisition, cross-selling and retention programs and deliver mathematically optimized offers.

The Company provides solutions that enable banks, credit unions, finance companies, installment lenders and other companies to automates and improve the processing of requests for credit or service. The Company provides customer management solutions for banking, where it�� account and customer management product is the FICO TRIAD! Customer Manager. The Company markets and sells TRIAD end-user software licenses, maintenance, consulting services, and strategy designs and evaluation. The Company's fraud management products improve the Company's clients' profitability by predicting the likelihood that a given transaction or customer account is experiencing fraud.

The Company's solutions are designed to detect and prevent a range of fraud and risk types across multiple industries, including credit and debit payment card fraud; e-payment fraud; deposit account fraud; technical fraud and bad debt; healthcare fraud; Medicaid and Medicare fraud, and property and casualty insurance claims fraud, including workers' compensation fraud. FICO fraud solutions protect financial institutions, insurance companies and government agencies from losses and damaged customer relationships caused by fraud and related criminal behavior.

FICO Fraud Predictor with Merchant Profiles is used in conjunction with Falcon Fraud Manager on payment card monitoring for credit and debit to improve fraud detection rates through the inclusion of merchant profiles. In addition to the Falcon products, the Company offers FICO Card Alert Service. Card Alert Service is a solution for fighting ATM debit fraud. The Card Alert Service identifies counterfeit payment cards and reports them to issuers. The Company offers FICO Economic Impact Service, which uses time series modeling of the macro economy to allow lenders to forecast future credit risk performance based on their views of the economy. Adeptra's software as a service (SaaS) platform enables financial services institutions and other businesses to take advantage of the explosion in mobile communication in order to manage risk, fight fraud and improve the customer experience, all in real time.

The Company competes with Acxiom, Epsilon, Equifax, Experian, Harte-Hanks, InfoUSA, KnowledgeBase, Merkle, TargetBase, CGI, NICE Systems, BAE, SAS, ACI Worldwide, Emdeon, Ingenix, ViPS, MedSt! at, Veris! k Analytics and IBM.

Scores

The Company develops credit scores based on third-party data. The Company's FICO Scores are used in most United States credit decisions, by the banks and credit card organizations, as well as by mortgage and auto loan originators. These scores provide a consistent and objective measure of an individual's credit risk. Credit grantors use the FICO Scores to prescreen candidates for solicitation, to evaluate applicants for new credit and to review existing accounts. The FICO Scores are calculated based on scoring models and implemented on third-party data. The version of the FICO Score for United States and Canadian lenders is the FICO 8 Score. The Company's other solutions include The FICO Credit Capacity Index and The FICO Economic Impact Index.

The Company competes with Experian and Experian-Scorex (U.S. partner), TransUnion and TransUnion International, Equifax, VantageScore, CRIF, LexisNexis and ChoicePoint.

Tools

The Company provides software products that businesses use to build their own tailored Decision Management applications. In contrast to its packaged Applications developed for specific industry applications, the Company�� Tools support the addition of Decision Management capabilities to virtually any application or operational system. These tools are sold as licensed software, and can be used by themselves or together to advance a client�� Decision Management initiatives. The Company uses these tools as common software components for its own Decision Management applications. The principal products offered are software tools include Rules Management, Predictive Modeling and Optimization.

The Company competes with IBM, SAS, Pegasystems and Angoss.

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By Dan Caplinger]

  A recent study from Fair Isaac's (NYSE: FICO  ) FICO took a look at the demographics of credit card use lately. What they found is that outstanding credit card debt among 18- to 29-year-olds dropped from just over $3,000 in late 2007 to a bit over $2,000 last October. That move comes as part of a broader reduction in overall indebtedness, with drops in outstanding mortgage, auto, and most other debt more than offsetting a substantial rise in student-loan debt. Even more surprisingly, the proportion of young adults going without credit cards entirely has risen to nearly one in six, almost double the level from late 2005.

• [By Dan Caplinger]

  What we do know
  Credit-reporting agencies aren't entirely opaque about what goes into their credit score calculations. For instance, Fair Isaac (NYSE: FICO  ) , the company behind the popular FICO score, offers a detailed explanation of what goes into every person's score. A strong payment history without delinquencies or late payments carries the most weight, making up 35% of the FICO score, while 30% comes from how the amounts you owe compare to the total credit you have available to you. Smaller percentages of the score come from other areas, including the length of your credit history, the amount of new credit you've taken out recently, and how wide a mix of different types of credit you have outstanding.

• [By Chris Neiger]

  The world of personal finance, debt and credit scores can be a scary and confusing place. While there's a lot of helpful information about there to be found, there are also piles of misinformation as well. To help you navigate through the personal finance trenches, let's take a look at three big myths for how to improve your�Fair Isaac Corporation (NYSE: FICO  ) score, as well as some solid steps that will actually help you improve your score.

• [By Rich Smith]

  Alamy You've probably heard by now that in some vague way, your credit rating has something to do with the premiums your auto insurance company charges you for coverage. But if you're like me, you've probably never quite understood the details of how this work. Fortunately, the good folks at InsuranceQuotes.com -- a subsidiary of Bankrate (RATE) -- recently published a report that draws back the curtain on this little-understood quirk of the insurance industry. Blame it on FICO Used to be, the rate you paid for insuring your car was tied primarily to demographic and personal factors that were clearly connected to the risk that you'd damage your car and ask the insurance company to pay for it: things like your age, sex, marital status, and driving history. It won't surprise anyone that younger, unmarried men are more likely to be risky drivers than soccer moms, and should therefore pay higher premiums. But about 20 years ago, the folks at Fair Isaac Corporation (FICO) found a correlation between low credit scores and a higher risk of filing an insurance claim. That's not causation, of course -- having bad credit doesn't somehow cause you to crash your car. But according to FICO, "people who choose to effectively manage their finances are also less likely to have future insurance losses." Conversely, there is a "statistical correlation between a person's credit score and the likelihood that he or she will file an auto insurance claim in the future." Suddenly, FICO had a new way to hawk its credit histories to insurance companies -- and insurance companies had a new excuse to raise your rates. News Flash: Everybody Does It Ever since, insurance companies have used this finding to tweak the rates they charge you for insurance. Today, says InsuranceQuotes, "about 97 percent of U.S. insurance companies" do it. But how do they do it, exactly?