Top 10 Stocks From 2014

One of the first things we can do when trying to anticipate what the best performing stocks may be this year is to take a look back and see what the top achievers were in 2014.

Below we can see the 10 best stocks in the Standard & Poor’s 500-stock index last year:

Companies such as Southwest Airlines and Delta Air Lines have benefited greatly from recent falls in fuel prices.

Interestingly, video game developer and tech interest Electronic Arts was the second-best performer in 2014, with seemingly no end to the list of triple-A titles being added to its repertoire. Upcoming titles such as Star Wars: Battlefront and Mass Effect Andromeda look set to further solidify EA’s position as the dominant force in the video game industry.

Having just been awarded an A- credit rating, medical research company Edwards Lifesciences Corp has now moved from a “market perform” rating to an “outperform” rating. The 2014 performance of Edwards Lifesciences Corp stock has reinforced its position in the market, earning it a “low default risk” status and three-star stock rating from Morningstar. Analysts at JP Morgan Chase & Co. also gave Edwards Lifesciences Corp shares an upgrade from a “neutral” to “overweight,” and increased their target price from $147 to $155 on May 12th.

Pharmaceutical research & development company Allergan, Inc, formally Actavis, was another fantastic performer in 2014, now becoming one of the world’s top 10 names in Big Pharma.

Moving down the list we reach Avago Technologies Ltd., which has been using its high cash status to extend its reach in the tech industry through multiple acquisitions. One such example of this is Avago’s purchase of semiconducting chip manufacturer Broadcom (BRCM).

Broadcom makes and supplies chips and other components to Apple for many of their products, so it looks as if Avago will be able to continue to expand its potential customer base thanks largely to its approximately $2.5 billion cash balance.

Glancing back to the pharmaceutical industry we have Mallinckrodt, which has recently invested 45 million Euros to create 45 new jobs. The Dublin-based company, which researches, manufactures, and supplies all manner of generic and branded pharmaceutical products also acquired Cadence Pharmaceuticals, Inc. in March 2014, and Questcor Pharmaceuticals, Inc. in August 2014.

Insiders at the tea and coffee distributor Keurig Green Mountain look to be quite ambitious, with the biggest purchase being to the tune of $1.3 million to buy 15,000 shares at an average price of $89.82. This is worth mentioning because Keurig Green Mountain insiders tend to have a knack for predicting where the stock prices will be headed in the near term.

Board members at the Catalyst Insider Buying fund have also been recently purchasing shares in Keurig Green Mountain (GMCR) as well as other notable interests such as General Electric (GE), General Motors (GM), and Chevron (CVX) to name but a few.

Risk warning:

Forward Rate Agreements, Options and CFDs (OTC Trading) are leveraged products that carry a substantial risk of loss up to your invested capital and may not be suitable for everyone. Please ensure that you understand fully the risks involved and do not invest money you cannot afford to lose. Our group of companies through its subsidiaries is licensed by the Cyprus Securities & Exchange Commission (Easy Forex Trading Ltd- CySEC, License Number 079/07), which has been passported in the European Union through the MiFID Directive and in Australia by ASIC (Easy Markets Pty Ltd -AFS license No. 246566).