Best Growth Stocks To Invest In 2014

Last week, Chipotle Mexican Grill (NYSE: CMG  ) beat analyst estimates with adjusted EPS of $2.35 in the first quarter. The good news sent Chipotle shares up as much as 10% as investors regained some confidence in the company's prospects. Chipotle has become a short target for some high-profile investors in the past year, most notably David Einhorn. At the Value Investing Congress last fall, Einhorn argued that Yum! Brands (NYSE: YUM  ) subsidiary Taco Bell would steal market share from Chipotle with its new Cantina Bell menu. Cantina Bell items were designed to be higher-quality than typical Taco Bell fare, but still cheap compared to Chipotle.

Wall Street seems to be downplaying the threat from Taco Bell, but Chipotle's first-quarter results were not nearly as impressive as they may seem to be. In the earnings release highlights, the company pointed out that diluted EPS rose 24.4% year over year, but later on it disclosed that much of the gain was due to one-time items. Moreover, comparable restaurant sales growth has nearly come to a halt, which is potentially ominous for Chipotle.

Best Life Sciences Stocks To Watch For 2015: Buffalo Wild Wings Inc.(BWLD)

Buffalo Wild Wings, Inc. engages in the ownership, operation, and franchise of restaurants in the United States. The company provides quick casual and casual dining services, as well as serves bottled beers, wines, and liquor. As of July 26, 2011, it had 773 Buffalo Wild Wings locations in 45 states in the United States, as well as in Canada. The company was founded in 1982 and is headquartered in Minneapolis, Minnesota.

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By Sean Williams]

  Buffalo Wild Wings (NASDAQ: BWLD  )
  Just because consumers refuse to give up their ability to take a vacation doesn't mean they aren't looking for other creative ways to save a dollar. Unless you're staying with family, you don't have much choice when it comes to food -- you have to eat out. I'm going out on a limb and projecting that Buffalo Wild Wings will be one of the biggest beneficiaries of consumers who dine out this summer. If you've kept up with the company's rapid expansion, you'd notice that it's moving into warmer, hot-spot vacation destinations within the United States. In addition, it's been adding new menu items that are reasonably priced and won't break a family of four's bank. With BWW's big sports-bar appeal and NCAA sponsorship, getting traffic into its restaurants this summer shouldn't be difficult. As long as chicken prices cooperate, I expect a sizable upside surprise from BWW in the coming quarters.

• [By Victor Nguyen]

  (c) 2014 Benzinga.com. Benzinga does not provide investment advice. All rights reserved.

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Best Growth Stocks To Invest In 2014: Crocs Inc.(CROX)

Crocs, Inc. and its subsidiaries engage in the design, development, manufacture, marketing, and distribution of footwear, apparel, and accessories for men, women, and children. The company primarily offers casual and athletic shoes, and shoe charms. It also designs and sells a range of footwear and accessories that utilize its proprietary closed cell-resin, called Croslite. The company?s footwear products include boots, sandals, sneakers, mules, and flats. In addition, it provides footwear products for the hospital, restaurant, hotel, and hospitality markets, as well as general foot care and diabetic-needs markets. Further, the company offers leather and ethylene vinyl acetate based footwear, sandals, and printed apparels principally for the beach, adventure, and action sports markets; and accessories comprising snap-on charms. The company sells its products through the United States and international retailers and distributors, as well as directly to end-user consumers th rough its company-operated retail stores, outlets, kiosks, and Web stores primarily under the Crocs Work, Crocs Rx, Jibbitz, Ocean Minded, and YOU by Crocs brand names. As of December 31, 2010, it operated 164 retail kiosks located in malls and other high foot traffic areas; 138 retail stores; 76 outlet stores; and 46 Web stores. Crocs, Inc. operates in the Americas, Europe, and Asia. The company was formerly known as Western Brands, LLC and changed its name to Crocs, Inc. in January 2005. Crocs, Inc. was founded in 1999 and is headquartered in Niwot, Colorado.

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By James Brumley]

  The next Crocs (CROX) earnings announcement is coming after the market closes Wednesday, Oct. 30, and if this report is anything like most Crocs earnings updates … well, investors have a 50-50 shot at hearing good news.

• [By Dan Caplinger]

  Stock investors got rewarded again for their risk tolerance Wednesday as major market benchmarks including the S&P 500 and Dow Jones Industrials rose to new all-time record highs. Even amid the generally bullish sentiment, RealD (NYSE: RLD  ) , Crocs (NASDAQ: CROX  ) , and Sina (NASDAQ: SINA  ) stood out because of their impressive gains. Let's look more closely at these stocks to see why they soared today.

• [By Monica Gerson]

  Crocs (NASDAQ: CROX) shares gained 9.83% to $14.64 in the pre-market after the company reported that it will receive a $200 million investment from Blackstone Group LP (NYSE: BX).

Best Growth Stocks To Invest In 2014: Thoratec Corporation(THOR)

Thoratec Corporation engages in the development, manufacture, and marketing of proprietary medical devices used for circulatory support. The company?s primary product lines include ventricular assist devices, such as HeartMate II, an implantable left ventricular assist device consisting of a rotary blood pump to provide intermediate and long-term mechanical circulatory support (MCS); and HeartMate XVE, an implantable and pulsatile left ventricular assist device for intermediate and longer-term MCS. Its ventricular assist devices also comprise Paracorporeal Ventricular Assist Device, an external pulsatile ventricular assist device, which provides left, right, and biventricular MCS approved for bridge-to-transplantation (BTT), including home discharge, and post-cardiotomy myocardial recovery; and Implantable Ventricular Assist Device, an implantable and pulsatile ventricular assist device designed to provide left, right, and biventricular MCS approved for BTT comprising hom e discharge, and post-cardiotomy myocardial recovery. The company also provides CentriMag, an extracorporeal full-flow acute surgical support platform that offers support up to 30 days for cardiac and respiratory failure. In addition, it offers PediMag and PediVAS extracorporeal full-flow acute surgical support platforms designed to provide acute surgical support to pediatric patients. The company sells its products through direct sales force in the United States, as well as through a network of distributors internationally. Thoratec Corporation was founded in 1976 and is headquartered in Pleasanton, California.

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By Anna Prior]

  Medical device company Thoratec Corp.(THOR) has purchased Apica Cardiovascular Ltd., in a deal that includes $35 million in cash upfront and potential milestone payments of up to $40 million.

• [By Ali Berri]

  In trading on Thursday, healthcare shares were relative laggards, down on the day by about 0.62 percent. Meanwhile, top decliners in the sector included Thoratec (NASDAQ: THOR), down 28.4 percent, and PhotoMedex (NASDAQ: PHMD), off 14.6 percent.

• [By Brian Pacampara]

  What: Shares of medical device company Thoratec (NASDAQ: THOR  ) sank 12% today after its quarterly results missed Wall Street expectations. �

Best Growth Stocks To Invest In 2014: MEDIFAST INC(MED)

Medifast, Inc., through its subsidiaries, engages in the production, distribution, and sale of weight management and disease management products, and other consumable health and diet products in the United States. The company?s product lines include weight and disease management, meal replacement, and vitamins. It also operates weight control centers that offer Medifast programs for weight loss and maintenance, customized patient counseling, and inbody composition analysis. The company markets its products under the Medifast and Essential brand names, including shakes, appetite suppression shakes, women?s health shakes, diabetics shakes, joint health shakes, coronary health shakes, calorie burn drinks, calorie burn flavor infusers, antioxidant shakes, antioxidant flavor infusers, bars, crunch bars, soups, chili, oatmeal, pudding, scrambled eggs, hot cocoa, cappuccino, chai latte, iced teas, fruit drinks, pretzels, puffs, brownie, pancakes, soy crisps, crackers, and omega 3 and digestive health products. Medifast Inc. sells its products through various channels of distribution comprising Web, call center, independent health advisors, medical professionals, weight loss clinics, and direct consumer marketing supported via the phone and the Web; Take Shape for Life, a physician led network of independent health coaches; and weight control centers. The company was founded in 1980 and is headquartered in Owings Mills, Maryland.

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By Monica Gerson]

  Analysts expect Medifast (NYSE: MED) to post its Q4 earnings at $0.36 per share on revenue of $80.83 million. Medifast shares surged 2.19% to close at $26.08 on Friday.

Best Growth Stocks To Invest In 2014: Intuitive Surgical Inc.(ISRG)

Intuitive Surgical, Inc. designs, manufactures, and markets da Vinci surgical systems for various surgical procedures, including urologic, gynecologic, cardiothoracic, general, and head and neck surgeries. Its da Vinci surgical system consists of a surgeon?s console or consoles, a patient-side cart, a 3-D vision system, and proprietary ?wristed? instruments. The company?s da Vinci surgical system translates the surgeon?s natural hand movements on instrument controls at the console into corresponding micro-movements of instruments positioned inside the patient through small puncture incisions, or ports. It also manufactures a range of EndoWrist instruments, which incorporate wrist joints for natural dexterity for various surgical procedures. Its EndoWrist instruments consist of forceps, scissors, electrocautery, scalpels, and other surgical tools. In addition, it sells various vision and accessory products for use in conjunction with the da Vinci Surgical System as surgical procedures are performed. The company?s accessory products include sterile drapes used to ensure a sterile field during surgery; vision products, such as replacement 3-D stereo endoscopes, camera heads, light guides, and other items. It markets its products through sales representatives in the United States, and through sales representatives and distributors in international markets. The company was founded in 1995 and is headquartered in Sunnyvale, California.

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By Ben Levisohn]

  Yesterday, shares of Intuitive Surgical (ISRG) jumped 13% after the FDA approved its latest robotic-surgery device. Today, Intuitive Surgical’s shares are rising again after the company was upgraded by JMP Securities.

  JMP Securities’ J.T. Haresco explains why he upgraded Intuitive Surgical:

  We are substantially raising our 2015 estimates and upgrading shares of Intuitive Surgical from Market Underperform to Market Outperform, and establishing a $700 price target after spending time sizing up the new Xi. Yesterday, Intuitive announced that the FDA approved the fourth generationda Vinci system, the Xi. We were able to spend some time with the Xi at the company’s headquarters in Sunnyvale, and believe that its introduction can overcome our key concerns: 1) the $1.8M device targeted at complex surgery will eventually replace a large percentage of the install base of ~2,000 Si models in the U.S., 2) with the existing Si fleet depreciated to approximately $700K, they are likely to find a second life in outpatient surgical centers, solving the need for better ROI in those surgical venues, 3) the Xi’s autodeployment feature will reduce setup time, again solving one of our main issues with the existing Si platform, and 4) the higher price point will raise ASPs over time.

  Overall, that should boost Intuitive Surgical’s revenue growth from 0.3% to 16%, Haresco says, while earnings per share could grow by as much as 27%, after falling 10%.

  Shares of Intuitive Surgical have gained 4.1% to $513.63 at 12:39 p.m.

  You can read Barron’s take here.

• [By Laura Brodbeck]

  Next week investors will be waiting for several key earnings reports including�General Electric Company (NYSE: GE), Intuitive Surgical, Inc. (NASDAQ: ISRG), Peabody Energy Corporation (NYSE: BTU), Nokia Corporation (NYSE: NOK), PrivateBancorp, Inc. (NASDAQ: PVTB),Yahoo! Inc. (NASDAQ: YHOO), Bank of America Corp (NYSE: BAC) and Verizon Communications Inc. (NYSE: VZ).

• [By Rich Smith]

  This series, brought to you by Yahoo! Finance, looks at which upgrades and downgrades make sense and which ones investors should act on. Today, our headlines include a pair of earnings-inspired downgrades for first Advanced Micro Devices (NYSE: AMD  ) �and�Intuitive Surgical (NASDAQ: ISRG  ) .

• [By Steve Symington]

  Still, customers who owned MAKO's RIO robots in 2012 only performed an average of just 6.7 monthly procedures per system last year, and monthly utilization per site fell to 6.6 procedures last quarter. By contrast, consider MAKO's soft-tissue counterpart in�Intuitive Surgical� (NASDAQ: ISRG  ) ,�whose customers performed around 13 procedures per month last year with each of Intuitive's da Vinci robots.�

Best Growth Stocks To Invest In 2014: Nordstrom Inc.(JWN)

Nordstrom, Inc., a fashion specialty retailer, offers apparel, shoes, cosmetics, and accessories for women, men, and children in the United States. It offers a selection of brand name and private label merchandise. The company sells its products through various channels, including Nordstrom full-line stores, off-price Nordstrom Rack stores, Jeffrey? boutiques, treasure & bond, and Last Chance clearance stores; and its online store, nordstrom.com, as well as through catalog. Nordstrom also provides a private label card, two Nordstrom VISA credit cards, and a debit card for Nordstrom purchases. The company?s credit and debit cards feature a shopping-based loyalty program. As of September 30, 2011, it operated 222 stores, including 117 full-line stores, 101 Nordstrom Racks, 2 Jeffrey boutiques, 1 treasure & bond store, and 1 clearance store in 30 states. The company was founded in 1901 and is based in Seattle, Washington.

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By Ben Levisohn]

  The day’s winners include Nordstrom (JWN), which gained 3.4% to $60.79 and is scheduled to report earnings on Thursday, and Mosaic (MOS), which jumped 3.2% to $43.85 and continued its strong showing following a Friday upgrade.

• [By Ben Eisen]

  Given that outlook, he sees ten stocks in the consumer discretionary sector that qualify as bargains at the moment, including some of the very stocks that are expecting downbeat holiday results. They include: Advance Auto Parts Inc. (AAP) , AutoNation, Inc. (AN) , Bed Bath & Beyond Inc. (BBBY) , Carmax, Inc. (KMX) �, Nordstrom Inc. (JWN) �, PetsMart, Inc. (PETM) �, Ross Stores, Inc. (ROST) , Staples, Inc. (SPLS) �, Target Corp. (TGT) �, and Urban Outfitters, Inc. (URBN) .