4 Interesting Top-Growth Stocks By Richard Snow

Richard Snow, who began his career investing the proceeds from the sale of the Snow Family businesses, is the founder of Snow Capital. His reputation grew and others began asking him to administer their assets. Snow Capital Management now controls over $2.6 billion in equity assets, placed in accordance with three different strategies, for mutual fund and institutional customers. Its flagship All-Cap Value fund has produced market-beating 15.74% annualized returns since the fund's creation in 1992. Apart from the All-Cap Value fund, Snow Capital as well manages client assets pursuant to this agreement the Large-Cap Value and Small-Cap Value strategies for mutual fund as so then as institutional customers.

Based in Naples, Fla., and founded in 1977, Health Management Associates operates general acute care hospitals, and other health care facilities, across the U.S. Its objective is to be the highest ranked health care provider of any hospital franchise in the U.S., according to Medicare. Since Sept. 30, 2011, Health Management, by and through its subsidiaries, managed 66 hospitals with an aggregate of 10,441 licensed beds, as a rule in non-urban communities, in 15 states, mainly in the southeastern U.S. Outpatient services play a vital role in the provision of healthcare, with roughly half the net revenue coming from outpatient activities.

Health Management shares offer upside potential as the group's operating turnaround begins to improve margins. Higher EBITDA growth has traditionally been a main objective for management. Health Management expects EBITDA margins to improve henceforth with efforts to increase revenue, gain higher-yield managed care contracts, and promote better performance of employed physicians.

The business grow

Health Management reaffirmed its obligation to make the business grow, by using free cash flows to acquire hospital systems, which establishes a precedent for additional acquisitions. The company remains willing to undertake acquisitions. It acquired Wuesthoff Health System in 2010 and, in July 2011, it purchased assets of Mercy Health Partners located in east Tennessee. Later on, in February 2012, a subsidiary of the company signed a definitive agreement with Integris Health for a joint venture deal with five hospitals in Oklahoma. As regards the agreement, Health Management will take an 80% stake in each hospital. The group added that the pipeline of hospital purchases is full of potential activity and stands at a top level rarely witnessed in the past. To boot, the quality of acquisition targets is high in terms of condition of the properties and their location.

In terms of income and revenue growth, Health Management has a three-year average revenue growth of 10.0% and a three-year net income average growth of 2.05%. Its current revenue year over year growth is 13.99%, higher than its 2010 revenue growth of 11.75%. The fact that revenue increased from last year shows me that the business is performing so then. The current Net Income year over year growth is 19.09%, higher than its 2010 net income year-over-year growth of 8.6%. I like when Net Income growth is higher than the past.

International Business Machines was established in the State of New York in 1911 as Computing-Tabulating-Recording Co.. At the time in 1924, the name was changed to International Business Machines Corporation. The company participates in the development and manufacturing of advanced information research, including computer and storage systems, software and microelectronics. Primary operations are categorized into the Global Innovation Services segment, Global Business Services segment, Systems and Research segment, Software segment and Global Financing segment.

I think IBM's strong growth reflects its decision to implement higher-value, productivity efforts that bring about longer-term benefits, as then as its transformation into a globally integrated enterprise. IBM concentrates on high-growth, high-value segments of the IT industry. IBM's growth efforts, including its smarter planet and industry frameworks, growth markets, business analytics, and optimization and cloud computing have delivered significant growth and generated high profit margins for the group. It is expected for these initiatives to deliver anyway $50 billion in earnings by fiscal 2015. By 2015, the company expects to create smarter planet and smarter commerce earnings of $10.0 billion and $20.0 billion, respectively. In other respects, business analytics is estimated to produce $16.0 billion, during cloud computing is expected to deliver $7.0 billion in earnings by 2015.

The company's long-term growth

There is optimism about the company's long-term growth and estimate it to post stronger results, supported by its initiatives in the aforementioned areas. The group's data center solution and cloud computing initiative will as well foster growth. IBM is a leader in the middleware business with nearly 33.0% market share. Its middleware products include Websphere, Lotus, Tivoli and Rational that are used to connect different types of software systems. With an investment of over $60.0 billion in R&D since 2000, IBM has created an Analytics Solution center, Business Resilience service delivery centers and Cloud computing centers all around the world. I expect these centers will help increase revenues from this point on.

There is optimism about IBM's growing gain margins. New initiatives helped IBM produce gross profit margin of 46.1% in 2010, up from 45.7% in 2009. Margins rose for the seventh consecutive year. This shows improved business mix, operating leverage and the constant success of the company's productivity initiatives. IBM is as well profiting from a higher mix of high-margin Services and Software businesses that have derived in improved margin and profitability. IBM expects to achieve $0.75 in additional EPS from the change toward higher-margin businesses. The group expects software alone to contribute virtually 50% to its profit by 2015. New product ramp up in the highest-margin server product lines, as so then as incremental product launches in the hardware and software space are estimated to soar IBM's market share and bring about margin expansion in the long term.

IBM's current net profit margin is 14.83%, currently lower that its 2010 margin of 14.85%. Its current return on equity is 73.43%, higher than the +20% standard I look for in companies I invest in and as well higher than its 2010 average ROE of 64.96%. In terms of income and revenue growth, IBM has a three-year average revenue growth of 1.05% and a three-year net income average growth of 8.73%. Its current revenue year-over-year growth is 7.05%, higher than its 2010 revenue growth of 4.30%. The current Net Income year-over-year growth is 6.89%, lower than its 2010 net income year-over-year growth of 10.49%. In terms of Valuation Ratios, IBM is trading at a Price/Book of 11.8x, a Price/Sales of 2.3x and a Price/Cash Flow of 12.6x in comparison to its Industry Averages of 5.4x Book, 2.0x Sales and 10.7x Cash Flow. It is essential to analyze the current valuation of IMB and check how it is trading in relation to its peer group.

With its headquarters in Israel, Teva Pharmaceutical is the world's largest generic pharmaceutical manufacturer operating in 60 countries. Teva runs 53 finished dosage sites, 17 innovation and development centers, and 21 active pharmaceutical ingredient manufacturing sites. The group as well develops and sells branded pharmaceuticals, including Copaxone, one of the leading multiple sclerosis drugs of the world. Branded drug sales represent in broad outline 37% of revenue. Teva's worldwide low-cost operations, expansion into developing markets, complex generic manufacturing capabilities, and drug pipeline should preserve the company's growth, profitability, and market dominance.

The double of the straightway competitor's revenue

Having more than the double of the straightway competitor's revenue, Teva's broad market exposure, massive manufacturing infrastructure, and vertically integrated operations position the firm as a leader in the generics industry. The generics market is highly fragmented, particularly in low-cost labor markets just as India and China, however a select few firms control the lion's share of global generics production. Thanks to a history of rapid acquisitions, Teva has amassed near a quarter of industry market share, massive economies of scale, and vertically integrated operations. According to our estimates, Teva, Sandoz, Mylan, and Watson account for about half of all generics sales.

Teva's current net profit margin is 15.07%, currently lower that its 2010 margin of 20.66%. Its current return on equity is 12.5%, lower than the +20% standard I look for in companies I invest in and as well lower than its 2010 average ROE of 16.18%. In terms of income and revenue growth, TEVA has a 3-year average revenue growth of 18.2%1 and a 3-year net income average growth of 63.18%. Its current revenue year over year growth is 13.59%, lower than its 2010 revenue growth of 15.99%. The current Net Income year over year growth is -17.17%, lower than its 2010 net income y/y growth of 66.55%.

In relation to Valuation, Teva ended 2011 on a strong note with the U.S. generics business showing signs of resurging. Fourth quarter gains of $1.59 per American Depository Share were a penny above the Zacks Consensus Estimate and 27.2% above the year-ago revenues. Fourth quarter earnings rose 28.5% to $5.7 billion, just above the Zacks Consensus Estimate of $5.6 billion. There's an estimate that generic sales will improve in early 2012 given the exclusive generic launch of Zyprexa. Approval for generic Lovenox would be an important boost for the stock. The increase in dividend is encouraging as so then. Together, Teva's acquisition of Cephalon should help the company expand and strengthen its branded and specialty pharma business. However, the Copaxone patent case remains an overhang. I think Teva will go afterwards small deals and purchases to reduce its dependence on Copaxone. Teva's present trailing 12-month revenues multiple is 8.9, compared to the 17.9 average for the industry and 14.2 for the S&P 500. At present, the stock is trading at 7.9x our 2012 EPADS estimate.

The leading food processing companies in the world

One of the leading food processing companies in the world, Archer Daniels Midland processes oilseeds, corn, wheat, cocoa, and other feedstuffs, and is as well one of the leading manufacturers of vegetable oil, protein meal, corn sweeteners, flour, biodiesel, ethanol, and other value-added food and feed ingredients. Archer Daniels has as well a global grain elevator and transportation network for procurement, storage, cleansing and transportation of agricultural commodities. The company, based in Illinois, reports its operating results pursuant to this agreement four segments:

Archer Daniels Midland, one of the largest agricultural commodity companies, has a highly diversified agricultural origination, processing and distribution network. The company produces corn, soybeans, wheat, and cocoa through farmers, processes these materials through its refineries, and creates value along the chain. Moreover, it generates trading revenue through its extensive knowledge about the shifts in the global market prices. From this point onward, I expect the company to continue its R&D efforts to create additional applications for these crops and expand the variety of feed stocks into areas like palm, sugar and other biomass.

Strong competitive advantage over regional players

ADM's worldwide network is a strong competitive advantage over regional players. ADM is exposed to price risks with both feedstock and commodity end products, similar to a refiner or commodity chemical company. But, the main difference is ADM owns its network for collection and distribution, which provides the company with some level of bargaining power, particularly with upstream suppliers.

The company remains positive about the long-term fundamentals of its business and the growing revenues power of the company and it continues to execute its plan to drive shareholder value: prioritizing capital projects, implementing productivity measures and returning capital to shareholders through increased dividends and share buybacks.

In terms of income and revenue growth, AMD has a 3-year average revenue growth of 4.94% and a 3-year net income average growth of 4.15%. Its current revenue year over year growth is 30.79%, higher than its 2010 revenue growth of -10.8%. The fact that revenue increased from last year show me that the business is performing then. The current Net Income year over year growth is 5.49%, lower than its 2010 net income y/y growth of 14.61%. I do not like when current net income growth is less than the past year. I look for Companies that increase both profits and earnings. In terms of Valuation Ratios, AMD is trading at a Price/Book of 1.2x, a Price/Sales of 0.2x and a Price/Cash Flow of 4.5x in comparison to its Industry Averages of 1.3x Book, 0.3x Sales and 4.9x Cash Flow.