10 Best Japanese Stocks To Buy Right Now

Just like when he broke the Bank of England, netting $1 billion betting on the inevitable devaluation of the British pound, George Soros came into 2013 with a large currency bet: shorting the Japanese yen amid intense monetary easing encouraged by the administration of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe in order to jump-start the Japanese economy.  With the trade on since November, Soros Fund Management made a reported $1 billion profit to open a year in which he personally earned an estimated $4 billion, landing him atop our list of highest earning hedge fund managers.

Soros was involved in all sorts of high profile moves in 2013, both in the market and in his personal life.  The billionaire, who at 83 is now the world�� 26th richest person, had a hand in Herbalife Herbalife and JCPenney, two hedge fund battleground stocks, siding with Carl Icahn in the first instance and losing money along with Bill Ackman in the second.

The continued rise in the billionaire�� net worth has to do with the solid performance delivered by Soros Fund Management, which under the watchful eye of chief investment officer Scott Bessent has remained one of the best performing funds out there.

Best European Stocks To Watch Right Now: Tesla Motors Inc.(TSLA)

Tesla Motors, Inc. designs, develops, manufactures, and sells electric vehicles and advanced electric vehicle powertrain components. It offers Tesla Roadster, an electric sports car. The company markets and sells its vehicles directly to consumers through the phone and Internet, as well as through its network of Tesla stores. It operates 18 Tesla stores located in Boulder, Chicago, Los Angeles, Menlo Park, Miami, New York, Newport Beach, San Jose, Seattle, Washington, D.C., Copenhagen, London, Milan, Monaco, Munich, Paris, Tokyo, and Zurich. The company was founded in 2003 and is headquartered in Palo Alto, California.

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By Daniel Sparks]

  In the first quarter of 2013, Tesla Motors (NASDAQ: TSLA  ) stepped into the limelight. Reporting its first profitable quarter and sales of 4,900 vehicles, this electric-vehicle manufacturer is now a formidable competitor to U.S. luxury-auto manufacturers. Meanwhile, the market has taken notice. Tesla's stock is up about 275% year to date.�Expectations�are undoubtedly very high. In order to meet these expectations or (even better) outperform them, this electric-car manufacturer is going to need to succeed internationally.

• [By Brian Pacampara]

  What: Shares of Tesla Motors (NASDAQ: TSLA  ) slipped 2% in early Wednesday trading after Baird downgraded the electric vehicle maker from outperform to neutral.

• [By Tim Beyers]

  No doubt, Tesla Motors (NASDAQ: TSLA  ) has been one of the best investment opportunities of the past year. Profits and production are up, and the stock has tripled. Can it really get better? Does Tesla deserve to trade for more than $100 a share?
  
  Sure, says Tim Beyers of Motley Fool Rule Breakers and Motley Fool Supernova in the following video. Tesla is still in the early stages of the second phase in a three-phase strategy to create a mass-market carmaker capable of competing with the likes of Ford and General Motors.
  
  If CEO Elon Musk succeeds, today's $11 billion market cap will become a distant memory in 10-15 years. Instead, Tesla will rank near what Ford ($59 billion) and General Motors ($47 billion) command as of this writing. Not bad as far as investment opportunities go, right?

10 Best Japanese Stocks To Buy Right Now: Bonamour Inc (BONI)

Bonamour, Inc., incorporated on August 21, 2002, is a developer, distributor and reseller of health and beauty products and originator of the mind-body system. The Company�� products are sold under the Bonamour name. It has three skin care products, which it markets as Bonamour�� Rejuvenating Trio. These products include a rejuvenating skin cleanser, a cellular renewal complex and an anti-aging eye cream. All three products are formulated with its Bonamour Blend Active Plant Stem Cell Technology.

KLENZ is Bonamour�� rejuvenating skin cleanser. The cleanser is designed to cleanse and soften the skin, while minimizing the appearance of fine lines, wrinkles and pigmentation irregularities using the exfoliating benefits of glycolic acid. HI-DRAT is its cellular renewal complex. It utilizes antioxidants to protect against free radical damage. HI-DRAT is suitable for all skin types and formulated to help smooth away fine lines and wrinkles while rejuvenating the overall skin�� health.

KE-REKT is its anti-aging eye repair cream. It contains Argan, which accelerates skin�� natural repair process and helps combat chronological aging and loss of firmness. AKTE-VAT is its activating mineral mist. This weightless mist has been formulated to purify the skin and stimulate enzymatic activity to help increase the fibroblast production of pre-collagen. The mist locks in moisture and supplies vital nutrients to help give the skin a younger appearance. Its nutraceutical under development is DE-TOX, a hand, skin and nail detoxification treatment designed to help defend the body against aging free radical damage.

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By Peter Graham]

  Small cap stocks Bonamour Inc (OTCBB: BONI), Firstin Wireless Technology Inc (OTCMKTS: FINW) and Microchannel Technologies Corp (OTCBB: MCTC) have been attracting attention from variosu investment newsletters lately with at least two of these stocks being the subject of paid promotions. Of course, there is nothing wrong with properly disclosed paid promotions or investor relation types of activities as its up to investors and traders alike to do their due diligence. So how hot are these small cap stocks? Here is a quick reality check that might cool your appetite:

10 Best Japanese Stocks To Buy Right Now: The Hackett Group Inc.(HCKT)

The Hackett Group, Inc. operates as a strategic advisory and technology consulting firm primarily in the United States and western Europe. The company offers executive advisory programs, benchmarking, business transformation, and technology consulting services, as well as shared services, offshoring, and outsourcing advice. Its executive advisory programs consists of advisor inquiry, an inquiry service used by clients for access to fact-based advice on proven approaches and methods to increase the effectiveness of selling, general, and administrative processes (SG&A); best practice research, a research that provides insights into the proven approaches in use at organizations; peer interaction program comprising member-led Webcasts, annual Best Practice Conferences, annual Member Forums, membership performance surveys, and client-submitted content; and best practice intelligence center, an online, searchable repository of practices, performance metrics, conference presentat ions, and associated research. The company?s bench marking services conduct studies in the areas of SG&A, finance, human resources, information technology, procurement, enterprise performance management, shared service centers, and working capital management. These services are used by clients to establish priorities, generate organizational consensus, align compensation to establish performance goals, and develop the required business case for business and technology investments. Its business transformation programs help clients to develop coordinated strategy for achieving performance improvements across the enterprise; and Hackett Technology Solutions help clients choose and deploy the software applications that meet their needs and objectives. The company was formerly known as Answerthink, Inc. and changed its name to The Hackett Group, Inc. in January 2008. The Hackett Group, Inc. was founded in 1991 and is headquartered in Miami, Florida.

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By ValueArtifex]

  One such situation currently in the process of unfolding this month is a Dutch Tender by The Hackett Group (HCKT). I will briefly discuss the underlying business, what exactly a Dutch Auction (or in this case, a Tender) is, what options investors have when approaching this situation and how it could play out.

10 Best Japanese Stocks To Buy Right Now: Qualys Inc (QLYS)

Qualys, Inc. (Qualys), incorporated on December 30, 1999, is a provider of clouds security and compliance solutions that enable organizations to identify security risks to their information technology (IT) infrastructures, help protect their IT systems and applications from cyber attacks and achieve compliance with internal policies and external regulations. The Company designed its QualysGuard Cloud Platform to transform the way organizations secure and protect their IT infrastructures and applications. The Company's cloud platform offers an integrated suite of solutions that automates the lifecycle of asset discovery, security assessments, and compliance management for an organization's IT infrastructure and assets, whether they reside inside the organization, on their network perimeter or in the cloud.

The Company provides its solutions through a software-as-a-service model, primarily with renewable annual subscriptions. These subscriptions require customers to pay a fee in order to access the Company's cloud solutions. The Company's QualysGuard Cloud Platform consists of a suite of IT security and compliance solutions that leverage the Company's shared and extensible core services and its scalable multi-tenant cloud infrastructure. The Company's suite of solutions provides security intelligence by automating the life cycle of IT asset discovery, security assessment and compliance management. The Company's cloud platform's infrastructure includes integrated services that deliver a automated and scalable scanning infrastructure capable of scanning IT systems and Web applications, inside and outside corporate firewalls. The Company also provides open application program interfaces (APIs), and other developer tools that allow third parties to embed its technology into their solutions and build applications on its cloud platform.

The Company's suite of solutions, which the Company refers to as the QualysGuard Cloud Suite, includes Vulnerability Management, Web Application Sca! nning, Malware Detection Service, Policy Compliance, PCI Compliance and Qualys SECURE Seal. The Company's customers can subscribe to one or more of the Company's security and compliance solutions based on their initial needs and expand their subscriptions over time to new areas within their organization or to additional QualysGuard solutions. The Company offers two editions of its QualysGuard Cloud Suite, the Enterprise edition for large and medium-sized enterprises and the Express edition for small and medium-sized businesses.

QualysGuard Vulnerability Management (QualysGuard VM), is a solution that automates network auditing and vulnerability management across an organization, including network discovery and mapping, asset management, vulnerability reporting, and remediation tracking. QualysGuard Policy Compliance (QualysGuard PC) allows customers to analyze and collect configuration and access control information from their networked devices and Web applications and automatically maps this information to internal policies and external regulations in order to document compliance.

QualysGuard PCI Compliance (QualysGuard PCI) provides organizations that store cardholder data a automated solution to verify and document compliance with PCI DSS. QualysGuard Web Application Scanning (QualysGuard WAS) uses the scalability of its cloud platform to allow customers to discover, catalog and scan a large number of Web applications. QualysGuard Malware Detection Service (QualysGuard MDS) provides organizations with the ability to scan identify and remove malware infections from their Websites. QualysGuard Web Application Firewall (QualysGuard WAF) delivers enterprise-grade Web application security without associated with appliance-based Web application firewall solutions. QualysGuard SECURE Seal helps organizations demonstrate to their online customers that they maintain a proactive security program.

Core Services include asset tagging and management, reporting and dashboards! , questio! nnaires and collaboration, remediation and workflow, big data correlation and analytics engine, and alerts and notifications. The Company�� infrastructure layer, which it refer to as its Infrastructure, includes the data, data processing capabilities, software and hardware infrastructure and infrastructure management capabilities that provide the foundation for its cloud platform and allow the Company to automatically scale its Infrastructure and Core Services to scan millions of Internet protocols (IPs).

The Company competes with Hewlett-Packard Company, Imperva, Inc., International Business Machines Corporation, McAfee, Inc., Symantec Corporation, Barracuda Networks, Inc., BeyondTrust Software, Inc., Lumension Security, Inc., nCircle Network Security, Inc., NetIQ Corporation, Rapid7 LLC, Tenable Network Security, Inc. and Trustwave Holdings, Inc.

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By Jake L'Ecuyer]

  Equities Trading UP
  Qualys (NASDAQ: QLYS) shares shot up 8.24 percent to $20.68 after the company reported upbeat quarterly results.

  Shares of Office Depot (NYSE: ODP) got a boost, shooting up 15.95 percent to $4.84 after the company reported upbeat quarterly earnings and announced its plans to close at least 400 stores in the US.

10 Best Japanese Stocks To Buy Right Now: PPL Corporation(PPL)

PPL Corporation, an energy and utility holding company, generates and sells electricity; and delivers natural gas to approximately 5.3 million utility customers primarily in the northeastern and northwestern U.S. The company operates in four segments: Kentucky Regulated, International Regulated, Pennsylvania Regulated, and Supply. The Kentucky Regulated segment engages in the generation, transmission, distribution, and sale of electricity; and the distribution and sale of natural gas to approximately 1.3 million customers in Kentucky, Virginia, and Tennessee. The International Regulated segment owns and operates electricity distribution businesses in the United Kingdom that deliver electricity to 7.7 million customers. The Pennsylvania Regulated segment delivers electricity to approximately 1.4 million customers in eastern and central Pennsylvania. The Supply segment owns and operates power plants to generate electricity using coal, uranium, natural gas, oil, and water res ources; markets and trades electricity and other purchased power to wholesale and retail markets; and acquires and develops domestic generation projects. It controls or owns a portfolio of generation assets of approximately 11,000 megawatts in Montana and Pennsylvania. As of December 31, 2010, the company?s distribution system included 649 substations with a capacity of 25 million kVA, 28,838 circuit miles of overhead lines, and 24,131 cable miles of underground conductors in the United Kingdom. It also operated 377 substations with a capacity of 31 million kVA, 33,122 circuit miles of overhead lines, and 7,368 cable miles of underground conductors in Pennsylvania. The company was founded in 1920 and is headquartered in Allentown, Pennsylvania.

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By Justin Loiseau]

  Powering Pennsylvania
  Heading east, PPL (NYSE: PPL  ) announced Thursday that the Pennsylvania regulators have approved a new "Distribution System Improvement Charge" for its 1.4 million customers.

• [By Justin Loiseau]

  PP&L
  PP&L (NYSE: PPL  ) reported earnings May 2, missing on sales expectations but managing to squeak past earnings estimates. Top lines have been tumbling across the sector, and PPL's bottom line took a major hit when trimmed hedged wholesale power prices pushed its unregulated earnings down more than 50%.

• [By Justin Loiseau]

  FirstEnergy wasn't the only utility to feel the burn from backwards hedges. Exelon (NYSE: EXC  ) took a one-time $235 million hit this quarter as natural gas prices unexpectedly headed higher. Likewise, PP&L's (NYSE: PPL  ) generation unit EPS fell more than 50%, primarily because of trimmed hedged wholesale prices. Meanwhile, Ameren (NYSE: AEE  ) is defying traditional diversity by exiting the generation business and relying entirely on regulated sales for revenue. While this might cause the utility to lag when margins expand, it safeguards earnings and keeps this dividend stock sustainable no matter where commodity prices head.

• [By Justin Loiseau]

  PPL pilots new energy reduction program
  Across the pond, PPL's (NYSE: PPL  ) British utility Western Power Distribution is trying to get its commercial customers to cut consumption. The company announced this week that it will be offering 15 businesses financial incentives to reduce their overall electricity use and/or shift use to non-peak hours. While reduced demand might seem backwards for any business model, an electricity use reduction would allow PPL to forgo costly upgrades to its current electricity system. And, as the utility's energy efficiency project manager points out, carbon emission targets provide an additional reason to increase efficiencies where possible.

10 Best Japanese Stocks To Buy Right Now: Aware Inc.(AWRE)

Aware, Inc. supplies various products for the biometrics and digital subscriber line (DSL) service assurance industries primarily in the United States and Germany. It provides biometrics software products, including software development kits (SDKs); BioComponents; biometrics services platform to build and deploy server-based biometric data processing and workflow solutions; universal registration client that performs various biometric data capture, analysis, matching, formatting, and hardware abstraction functions; URC Mobile for performing biometric enrollment, identification, and screening on mobile biometric devices; FormScannerSE and FormScannerMB for scanning and processing of inked fingerprint cards; Forensic Workbench for the categorization, processing, and standards-compliant formatting of biometric images and demographic data; and WebEnroll for browser-based enrollment of biographic data, fingerprints, and facial images. The company also offers medical imaging pro ducts comprising AccuRad ImageShare server that provides viewing of medical images; AccuRad REM server, which collects radiation exposure estimation data, and then stores and analyzes the data to calculate exposure information; and AccuRad SDKs. In addition, it offers advanced imaging products, such as ArchivePack to store and distribute digital imagery; JPEG 2000 image compression software; and SeisPact for the storage and satellite transmission of seismic data from ships. Further, the company provides DSL service assurance products consisting of DSL diagnostics and management software; and DSL test modules for integration into DSL testhead and test set equipment. Additionally, it sells and/or licenses patents that are related to communications, signal processing, and compression technologies. The company serves governments and corporate customers through systems integrator, OEM, and direct sales channels. Aware, Inc. was founded in 1986 and is headquartered in Bedford, Mas sachusetts.

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By Garrett Cook]

  In trading on Friday, technology shares were relative leaders, up on the day by about 0.31 percent. Top gainers in the sector included Aware (NASDAQ: AWRE), up 15.4 percent, and Progress Software (NASDAQ: PRGS), up 7.7 percent.

• [By Garrett Cook]

  In trading on Friday, technology shares were relative leaders, up on the day by about 0.31 percent. Top gainers in the sector included Aware (NASDAQ: AWRE), up 15.4 percent, and Progress Software (NASDAQ: PRGS), up 7.7 percent.

10 Best Japanese Stocks To Buy Right Now: Build-A-Bear Workshop Inc. (BBW)

Build-A-Bear Workshop, Inc. operates as a specialty retailer of plush animals and related products. The company�s merchandise comprises various styles of animals to be stuffed; clothing, shoes, and accessories for the stuffed animals; and other brand appropriate toy and accessory items. It also licenses its Build-A-Bear Workshop brand to third parties to manufacture and sell merchandise to other retailers. As of January 31, 2013, the company operated approximately 400 Build-A-Bear Workshop stores worldwide, including the company-owned stores in the United States, Puerto Rico, Canada, the United Kingdom, and Ireland, as well as franchised stores in Europe, Asia, Australia, Africa, the Middle East, Mexico, and South America. The company also sells its products through a Web store. Build-A-Bear Workshop, Inc. was founded in 1997 and is headquartered in St. Louis, Missouri.

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By Rich Smith]

  After four months of looking, Build-A-Bear (NYSE: BBW  ) has found-a-CEO.

  After close of trading Monday, Build-A-Bear Workshop announced it has chosen Sharon Price John to become its new Chief Executive Officer and Chief President Bear. She will replace outgoing Chief Executive Bear�(the cute titles are undergoing a bit of a change) Maxine Clark, company founder, who announced her own intention to retire back in February.