JUNE 3, 2005
Advice from Standard and Poors
STOCK SCREENS

Ready, Steady -- Grow

Investors love companies with stable and solid track records. Here are 10 outfits that meet that requirement -- and much more



Equity investors find few things more reassuring than a stock with a solid track record. And while past performance is no guarantee of future results, of course, a history of steadily rising profits over a number of years can serve as a good signal of the strength of a company's business.


Along those lines, we set out to uncover some long-term winners in this week's screen. But we also wanted a little something extra. So, in addition to a typical earnings-growth filter -- in this case, five years of consecutive gains in earnings per share -- we wanted to find those companies that had stepped up the pace in a big way. So we looked for outfits that had year-over-year EPS growth of more than 50% for the last full fiscal year of that period -- and also in their most recent fiscal quarters.

Finally, to make sure that these names on the list were stable, liquid companies, all had to have a market cap above $500 million. When we finished running the numbers, these 10 names emerged:

  Steady EPS Growth with a Late Kick
Company Ticker
Coach Inc. COH
Cognizant Tech Solutions CTSH
D.R. Horton DHI
Epicor Software EPIC
First Marblehead FMD
Infosys Technologies INFY
Mediacom Communications MCCC
Per-Se Technologies PSTI
Pulte Homes PHM
Total TOT





All of the views expressed in this research report accurately reflect the research analyst's personal views regarding any and all of the subject securities or issuers. No part of analyst compensation was, is or will be, directly or indirectly related to the specific recommendations or views expressed in this research report.
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