New Positions on Covestor—December 22nd, 2010 (USNA, HOOK)

In his Market Comparables model, manager Richard Moore evaluates stocks based on their relative stock price movement and valuations over time. He also reviews financial forecasts to assess the potential for earnings growth.

This month, Moore added several positions to the model including UsaNA Health Sciences Inc (NASDAQ: USNA), the makers of nutritional and personal care products available in North America and Asia Pacific. On February 10th, 2010 Yahoo! Finance reported USNA’s closing price as $24.64. USNA rose to a closing price of $44.75 on August 9th, but then began to fall. According to Yahoo! Finance on December 22nd, USNA’s stock price had not fallen below $39 per share between August and December. USNA’s sales have grown from $423.1 million in 2007 to $429 million in 2008 to $436.9 million in 2009 and according to money.CNN.com, analysts expect 2010 sales to be between $498 million to $650 million.

Another addition to the model is Craft Brewers Alliance Inc (NASDAQ: HOOK), one of the leading brewers of hand-crafted beers in the United States. They have 31 different beers, most of which are distributed regionally although a few are distributed nationally.  On March 11th, 2009, HOOK hit a low closing price of $0.86 according to Yahoo! Finance. The price began to rise and on September 15th it reached $9.90. While it hasn’t held that price, it has still remained much higher than its 2009 lows, closing at $7.42 on December 22nd.  The company has seen some aggressive growth in their net revenues. In 2007, their reported net revenues were $41.5 million. In 2008 they rose to $79.8 million and in 2009 they climbed to $123.1 million. Over the first three quarters of 2010, HOOK has reported a total of $101.4 million in net revenues.