Beckman Coulter Inc. $64 – New York symbol BEC

BECKMAN COULTER INC. $64 (New York symbol BEC; Conservative Growth Portfolio, Manufacturing & Industry sector; Shares outstanding: 62.7 million; market cap: $4.0 billion; WSSF Rating: Average) makes lab equipment that doctors and medical researchers use to detect substances in bodily fluids.

The company sells most of… Read More

Long-time Favorite Is Still a Buy

We have generally stayed out of drug stocks in this decade, and that’s a good thing for our subscribers. Drug stock enthusiasts focus on the rising demand they foresee from aging baby boomers, for newly developed drugs which are more effective than older ones. They… Read More

Takeover Talk Highlights Strong Prospects

BECKMAN COULTER INC. $72 (New York symbol BEC; Conservative Growth Portfolio, Manufacturing & Industry sector; Shares outstanding: 62.6 million; Market cap: $4.5 billion; WSSF Rating: Average) rose to $77 in July after a competitor accepted a takeover offer from Germany’s Siemens AG. Investors felt that… Read More

Beckman walks away from Biosite

BECKMAN COULTER INC. $68 (New York symbol BEC; Conservative Growth Portfolio, Manufacturing & Industry sector; Shares outstanding: 61.9 million; Market cap: $4.2 billion; WSSF Rating: Average) recently agreed to pay $85 a share (total $1.55 billion) for publicly traded Biosite Inc., which makes heart disease… Read More

Looks like deja vu

BECKMAN COULTER INC. $63 (New York symbol BEC; Conservative Growth Portfolio, Manufacturing & Industry sector; Shares outstanding: 61.7 million; Market cap: $3.9 billion; WSSF Rating: Average) makes lab equipment that doctors and medical researchers use to detect substances in blood and other bodily fluids.

Beckman has… Read More

Income Trust Update

Our standing advice on income trusts is to limit them to one-sixth of your portfolio or less. In addition, we mainly recommend trusts that come out of trust conversions aimed at improving shareholder value.

We stay out of most new issues, trusts included. In our view,… Read More

Take The Risk Out Of Tech

The Internet and other communications advances get the word out on new technology almost instantaneously. The best new products build up huge sales overnight and the products they replace see their markets evaporate just as quick.

Many investors try to deal with this situation by chasing… Read More