Top Electric Utility Stocks To Watch Right Now

Based on the aggregated intelligence of 180,000-plus investors participating in Motley Fool CAPS, the Fool's free investing community, tobacco giant Altria (NYSE: MO  ) has earned a coveted five-star ranking.

With that in mind, let's take a closer look at Altria and see what CAPS investors are saying about the stock right now.

Altria facts

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Headquarters (founded)

Richmond, Va. (1919)

Market Cap

$71.3 billion

Industry

Tobacco

Trailing-12-Month Revenue

Top Electric Utility Stocks To Watch Right Now: Camden Property Trust (CPT)

Camden Property Trust is a real estate investment trust (REIT). The Company is engaged in the ownership, management, development, acquisition, and construction of multi-family apartment communities. As each of its communities has similar economic characteristics, residents, amenities, and services, its operations have been aggregated into one segment.

In April 2011, it sold one of its land parcels to one of the Funds. In June 2011, it sold another land parcel to the Fund. In August 2011, the Company acquired 30.1 acres of land located in Atlanta, Georgia. In December 2011, it acquired 2.2 acres of land in Glendale, California. During the year ended December 31, 2011, it sold two properties consisting of 788 units located in Dallas, Texas. During 2011, the Funds acquired 18 multifamily properties totaling 6,076 units located in the Houston, Dallas, Austin, San Antonio, Tampa and Atlanta. In January 2012, one of the Funds acquired one multifamily property consisted of 350 units located in Raleigh, North Carolina.

As of December 31, 2011, the Company owned interests in, operated, or were developing 206 multifamily properties comprising 69,794 apartment homes across the United States. Of these 206 properties, 10 properties were under development. In addition, it owns land parcels, which it focuses on developing into multifamily apartment communities.

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By Michael Lewis]

  Take Camden Property Trust (NYSE: CPT  ) , for example. The stock is up around 16% over two years -- respectable, but incongruent with the industry trends. Since 2010, operating cash flow has increased more than 30%. The company pays a 3.5% dividend and trades at 16.5 times projected one-year earnings. For comparison, Lennar trades at 18 times earnings, while KB Homes trades at more than 20 times forward earnings.

Top Electric Utility Stocks To Watch Right Now: NutriSystem Inc(NTRI)

Nutrisystem, Inc. provides weight management products and services in the United States. The company offers nutritionally balanced weight loss programs designed for women, men, and seniors. Its Nutrisystem program consists of approximately 130 portion-controlled items that serve as the foundation of a low Glycemic Index diet. The company?s programs include Nutrisystem D program designed for people with type 2 diabetes for loosing weight and managing their diabetes; SUCCESS program designed to take the weight off and keep it off through portion-controlled, balanced nutrition, and low Glycemic Index eating; and Nutrisystem Select, a program for weight loss and weight management that offers standard shelf-stable food and fresh-frozen foods. It also provides monthly food packages of shelf-stable and frozen foods consisting of 28 days of breakfasts, lunches, dinners, and desserts, which are supplemented with dairy, fruits, salads, vegetables, and low-glycemic carbohydrate item s. In addition, the company offers transition and maintenance plans that comprise support tools and desired meal occasions, as well as online and smart phone weight management tools. Nutrisystem, Inc. sells its pre-packaged foods to weight loss program participants directly through the Internet and telephone, as well as through QVC, a television shopping network. The company was founded in 1972 and is based in Fort Washington, Pennsylvania.

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By Lisa Levin]

  Consumer Services: The industry gained 1.46% by 10:30 am. The top performer in this industry was Nutrisystem (NASDAQ: NTRI), which gained 3.2%. Barrington Research initiates coverage on NutriSystem with a Outperform rating.

• [By Charles Sizemore]

  Now that I have you salivating thinking about burritos, what about traditional ��ealth��stocks such as diet products companies Weight Watchers (WTW) and Nutrisystem (NTRI) or vitamin and supplement retailer GNC Holdings (GNC)?

Hot New Stocks To Invest In 2015: Atlas Resource Partners LP (ARP)

Atlas Resource Partners, L.P. (Atlas Resource Partners), incorporated on October 13, 2011, is an independent developer and producer of natural gas, crude oil and natural gas liquids (NGL), with operations in basins across the United States. The Company is a sponsor and manager of investment partnerships, in which it co-invests, to finance a portion of its natural gas and oil production activities. During the year ended December 31, 2012, its average daily net production was approximately 77.2 million cubic feet equivalent. On December 20, 2012, it completed the acquisition of DTE Gas Resources, LLC from DTE Energy Company. On September 24, 2012, the Company acquired Equal Energy, Ltd.�� (Equal) remaining 50% interest in approximately 8,500 net undeveloped acres included in the joint venture. On July 26, 2012, it completed the acquisition of Titan Operating, L.L.C. On April 30, 2012, it acquired certain oil and natural gas assets from Carrizo Oil & Gas, Inc. In April 2012, it acquired a 50% interest in approximately 14,500 net undeveloped acres in the oil and NGL area of the Mississippi Lime play in northwestern Oklahoma.

Through December 31, 2012, the Company owned production positions in the areas of the Barnett Shale and Marble Falls play in the Fort Worth Basin in northern Texas; the Appalachia basin, including the Marcellus Shale and the Utica Shale; the Mississippi Lime and Hunton plays in northwestern Oklahoma, and the Chattanooga Shale in northeastern Tennessee, the Niobrara Shale in northeastern Colorado, the New Albany Shale in southwestern Indiana and the Antrim Shale in Michigan. During 2012, the Company had ownership interests in over 525 wells in the Barnett Shale and Marble Falls play and 569.3 billion cubic feet equivalent of total proved reserves with average daily production of 31.9 million cubic feet equivalent. During 2012, the Company had ownership interests in over 10,200 wells in the Appalachian basin, including approximately 270 wells in the Marcellus Shale and 1! 12.6 billion cubic feet equivalent of total proved reserves with average daily production of 35.6 million cubic feet equivalent. During 2012, it owned 21 billion cubic feet equivalent of total proved reserves with average daily production of 1.9 million cubic feet equivalent in the Mississippi Lime and Hunton plays in northwestern Oklahoma. During 2012, the Company had average daily production of 7.8 million cubic feet equivalent in the Chattanooga Shale in northeastern Tennessee, the Niobrara Shale in northeastern Colorado, the New Albany Shale in southwestern Indiana, and the Antrim Shale in Michigan.

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By Joseph Hogue]

  Atlas Resource Partners (NYSE: ARP  ) offers the lowest cost to DCF and the second-highest yield of the group. The company is active in the Barnett Shale, Appalachian Basin, the Raton Basin, the Black Warrior Basin and the Mississippi Lime with an interest in over 12,000 producing natural gas and oil wells. The partnership's coverage ratio just missed a top rank as well, and the units could be a solid addition. May saw insider purchases by four officers for 52,530 units at an average price of $19.73 per unit with no insider selling in the past twelve months.

Top Electric Utility Stocks To Watch Right Now: Canadian Solar Inc.(CSIQ)

Canadian Solar Inc. engages in the design, development, manufacture, and sale of solar power products in Canada and internationally. The company offers solar cell and solar module products that convert sunlight into electricity for various uses. Its products include a range of standard solar modules for use in a range of residential, commercial, and industrial solar power generation systems. The company also designs and produces specialty solar modules and products consisting of customized modules that its customers incorporate into their products, such as solar-powered bus stop lighting; and specialty products, such as portable solar home systems and solar-powered car battery chargers. In addition, it sells solar system kits, a package consisting of solar modules produced by it and third party supplied components, such as inverters, racking system, and other accessories, as well as implements solar power development projects. The company sells its products under the Canad ian Solar brand name. Canadian Solar Inc. offers its standard solar modules through a direct sales force and sales agents primarily to distributors, system integrators, and original equipment manufacturer customers, as well as to solar projects; and specialty solar modules and products to the automotive, telecommunications, and light-emitting diode lighting sectors. The company was founded in 2001 and is based in Kitchener, Canada.

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By Jason Shubnell]

  Leading and Lagging Sectors
  Technology stocks gained Friday, with Parametric Sound (NASDAQ: PAMT) leading advancers after the company provided post merger update and outlook. Among the leading sector stocks, gains came from 21Vianet Group (NASDAQ: VNET), BlackBerry (NASDAQ: BBRY), Canadian Solar (NASDAQ: CSIQ), and Veeco Instruments (NASDAQ: VECO).
  In trading on Friday, utilities shares rose by just 0.06 percent. Among the sector stocks, Exterran Partners LP (NASDAQ: EXLP) was down more than 4.8 percent, while PG&E (NYSE: PCG) tumbled around 3.75 percent.
  Top Headline
  BlackBerry (NASDAQ: BBRY) posted a narrower-than-expected fourth-quarter loss.
  BlackBerry posted a quarterly net loss of $423 million, or $0.80 per share, versus a year-ago profit of $98 million, or $0.19 per share. Its loss from continuing operations came in at $423 million, or $0.80 per share, compared to a year-ago profit of $94 million, or $0.18 per share. BlackBerry�� adjusted loss from continuing operations came in at $0.08 per share.
  Its revenue slipped 64% to $976 million. However, analysts were estimating a loss of $0.56 per share on revenue of $1.17 billion. BlackBerry sold around 3.4 million smartphones in the quarter.
  Equities Trading UP
  Finish Line (NASDAQ: FINL) shares shot up 3.64 percent to $27.44 after the company posted better-than-expected fourth-quarter earnings.

• [By Anna Prior]

  Fund management group DIF agreed to acquire four new solar power plants from a Canadian Solar Inc.(CSIQ) (CSIQ) subsidiary for an undisclosed sum.

  General Electric Co.(GE) agreed to sell the so-called Vital Signs segment of its health-care operation to CareFusion Corp.(CFN) (CFN) for $500 million.

• [By Paul Ausick]

  Chinese solar companies are a different story. Many manufacture their own silicon wafers and sell silicon to other makers. Trina Solar Ltd. (NYSE: TSL), LDK Solar Co. Ltd. (NYSE: LDK), JA Solar Holdings Co. Ltd. (NASDAQ: JASO) and Canadian Solar Inc. (NASDAQ: CSIQ) all manufacture and sell solar ingots, wafers or cells.

Top Electric Utility Stocks To Watch Right Now: Chimera Investment Corporation (CIM)

Chimera Investment Corporation operates as a real estate investment trust (REIT) in the United States. The company, through its subsidiaries, invests in residential mortgage-backed securities (RMBS), residential mortgage loans, commercial mortgage loans, real estate-related securities, and other asset classes. Its targeted asset classes include agency or non-agency RMBS; prime, jumbo prime, and Alt-A mortgage loans; first or second lien loans secured by multifamily properties, mixed residential or other commercial properties, retail properties, office properties, or industrial properties; and asset-based securities (ABS), including commercial mortgage-backed securities, debt and equity tranches of collateralized debt obligations, and consumer and non-consumer ABS. The company has elected to be treated as a REIT for federal income tax purposes and would not be subject to income tax, if it distributes at least 90% of its REIT taxable income to its share holders. Chimera Inve stment Corporation was founded in 2007 and is based in New York, New York.

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By John Maxfield]

  "Nepotism has never been unknown in American banking," Martin Mayer wrote in The Greatest-Ever Bank Robbery, his 1990 book about the savings-and-loan crisis. While Mayer was referring to American Continental, the notoriously corrupt holding company run into the ground by the infamous Charles Keating in the 1980s, his point rings true today in the case of Annaly Capital Management (NYSE: NLY  ) and its publicly traded portfolio company Chimera Investment (NYSE: CIM  ) .

• [By John Maxfield]

  Well, it just so turns out that there is. And Annaly Capital Management (NYSE: NLY  ) , the parent company in our nonhypothetical tale, has figured out how -- for the record, the publicly traded subsidiary is Chimera Investment Management (NYSE: CIM  ) .

Top Electric Utility Stocks To Watch Right Now: Boot(h)

Henry Boot PLC, together with its subsidiaries, operates as a property and construction company in the United Kingdom. Its property portfolio includes retail warehousing properties, leisure and retail parks, town centre retail and mixed use properties, industrial and office properties, and business parks. The company engages in the acquisition, promotion, development, and trading of land; and holds interest in 8,200 acres of land through ownership, option, and agency agreements. It also involves in construction, civil engineering, and road maintenance activities; and offers construction services to the health, education, housing, custodial, and public sectors. In addition, the company offers a range of products and services for sale and hire, such as fleet of contractors' mechanical plant and equipment ranging from telehandlers to rollers; boom and scissor lift access platforms suitable for slab or rough terrain work; accommodation units for applications, including offices , canteens, showers, toilets, and security stores; power tools and equipment consisting of electric tools, engine powered items, concreting and compaction tools, lightweight access equipment, heating and lighting appliances, and home maintenance items; and fleet of machines for construction and industrial applications. Henry Boot PLC was founded in 1886 and is headquartered in Sheffield, the United Kingdom.

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By Eric Volkman]

  Alamy Quick, what's the most recognized brand name in the hotel industry? Chances are good that your knee-jerk answer was "Hilton." That well-known moniker is especially prominent last week, as Hilton Worldwide Holdings (HLT), the company that now owns the hallowed brand, has brought it back to the stock market in the form of an initial public offering on the New York Stock Exchange. Wednesday, the company priced the IPO at $20 per share, and due to strong demand, raised the number of shares to be sold to 117.6 million from the originally anticipated 112.8 million. That means gross proceeds just north of $2.35 billion, the highest in history for a hotel operator. Hilton's coming to market now because its majority owner, financial services powerhouse The Blackstone Group (BX), wants to cash out on its investment. The company took the hotel operator private with several partners in 2007. Since then, Blackstone has watched other big names in the hospitality sector launch well-received IPOs. In late 2009, for instance, Hyatt Hotels (H) debuted on the NYSE, raising gross proceeds of $950 million -- enough to make it one of the highest-grossing issues of that year. That was also good enough to make its shareholders wealthier; from a listing price of $25 per share, the stock closed at $28 on its first day of trading, and just over four years later, it has nearly doubled to more than $46. More recently, Blackstone had skin in the game in the IPO of long-term hotel operator Extended Stay America (STAY) as a co-owner along with peer financials Centerbridge Partners and Paulson. The shares of ESA rose nearly 20 percent on the company's market debut last month and have since crept higher. Those kinds of numbers were surely irresistible to Blackstone, which has wisely decided not to sell any of its own Hilton shares in the IPO. Rather, the wily financier says it will dole them out gradually in the months and years ahead. It needs the time -- the company owns more than 75

• [By Teresa Rivas]

  Shares of Hyatt Hotels Corp. (H) were ahead by more than 5% in recent trading, following the company�� strong second-quarter results.

  The company said it earned $112 million, or 70 cents a share, up from $39 million, or 24 cents, a year earlier. Excluding one-time items, adjusted earnings rose to 43 cents a share from 24 cents.

  Revenue climbed 7.7% to $1.09 billion.

  Analysts were looking for per-share earnings of 30 cents on revenue of $1.07 billion.

  Revenue per available room, a widely watched performance metric, grew 7.1% at comparable hotels. Occupancy increased to 79.8% from 79.2% and average daily rates moved up by 6.3%.

  Owned and leased hotel operating margin expanded to 27.8% from 26.3%.

  The company forecast $250 million in capital expenditures for the fiscal year.

  FBR Capital Market�� Nikhil Bhalla notes that after three misses in the past year, the Street�� estimates have become more conservative. While he isn�� surprised that markets are reacting positive to the report, he thinks it is still too early to tell if the results are sustainable, as he sees potential softness for group bookings and volatility for China and India properties.

  Hyatt is up 16% in the past year.

• [By Jesse Solomon]

  Investors have taken notice. Marriott International (MAR)has soared 33% this year while Hyatt (H) is up 26%. Hilton (HLT) has spiked roughly 23% from its initial public offering in December.

• [By Dan Caplinger]

  4. Hawaii
  The poor pay 13% of their income in taxes in Hawaii, although the state has relatively high taxes across the board. Even tourists end up paying at least their fair share of taxes, with a double-digit percentage hotel tax imposed on Starwood (NYSE: HOT  ) , Hyatt (NYSE: H  ) , and other hotel chains, which they then pass on to their guests. The wealthy in Hawaii pay an average tax rate of 8%, the highest of the states on this list, because of extremely high marginal rates on income taxes that range as high as 11%. The sales tax is relatively reasonable at 4%, but the key problem is that the sales tax applies to grocery purchases, which hits the poor especially hard.

Top Electric Utility Stocks To Watch Right Now: Palo Alto Networks Inc (PANW)

Palo Alto Networks, Inc., incorporated in March 2005, offers a network security platform that allows enterprises, service providers, and government entities to secure their networks. The core of its platform is the Company�� firewall that delivers natively integrated application, user, and content visibility and control through its operating system, hardware, and software architecture. The Company primarily sells its products and services to end-customers through distributors, resellers, and partners, and directly to end-customers (collectively partners), who are supported by its sales and marketing organization, in the Americas, in Europe, the Middle East, and Africa (EMEA), and in Asia Pacific and Japan (APAC). Its products and services can address a range of its end-customers��network security requirements, from the data center to the network perimeter, as well as the distributed enterprise, which includes branch offices and a number of mobile devices. It introduced PA-5000 Series and GlobalProtect subscription service in March 2011 and the PA-200 and WildFire subscription service in November 2011.

The Company�� platform is delivered in an appliance form factor and includes a suite of subscription services, as well as support and maintenance. Its subscription services can be activated on any of its appliances. All of the Company�� appliances incorporate its PAN-OS operating system and are based on its identification technologies, App-ID, User-ID, and Content-ID, which allow security policies to be defined within the context of applications, users, and content. It delivers these capabilities through a single-pass parallel processing architecture that simultaneously performs multiple identification, security and networking functions. The Company serves the enterprise network security market, which consists of Firewall/ Virtual Private Network (VPN), Unified Threat Management (UTM), Web Gateway, Intrusion Detection and Prevention (IDP/IPS), and VPN technologies. The Company deriv! ed 62% of its total revenue from the Americas, 27% from Europe, the Middle East, and Africa (EMEA), and 11% from Asia Pacific and Japan (APAC) as of January 31, 2012.

The Company derives revenue from sales of its products and services, which together comprise its platform. Product revenue is primarily generated from sales of its Firewall. The Company�� Threat Prevention, universal resource locator (URL) Filtering, and GlobalProtect subscriptions provide its end-customers with real-time access to the antivirus, intrusion prevention, Web filtering, and malware protection capabilities across fixed and mobile devices. The Company�� application classification engine, called App-ID, uses multiple identification techniques to determine the exact identity of applications traversing the network. App-ID is the foundational classification engine that provides the core traffic classification to all other functions in its platform. The App-ID classification is used to invoke other security functions.

App-ID uses a series of classification techniques to identify an application. App-ID classifies all network traffic, including business applications, consumer applications, and network protocols, across all ports. User-ID integrates its platform with a range of enterprise user directories and technologies, including Active Directory, eDirectory, Open LDAP, Citrix Terminal Server, Microsoft Exchange, Microsoft Terminal Server, and ZENworks. Content-ID is a collection of technologies that enables its subscription services. Content-ID combines a real-time threat prevention engine, cloud-based analysis service, and a URL categorization database to limit unauthorized data and file transfers, detect and block a range of threats, and control non-work related Web surfing. Its WildFire, cloud-based analysis service provides a real-time analysis engine for detecting previously unseen malware. Its URL filtering database consists of millions of URLs across many categories and is designed to monitor a! nd contro! l employee Web surfing activities. Single-Pass Parallel Processing Architecture (SP3) has two elements: single-pass software and parallel processing hardware.

The PAN-OS Operating System operating system provides the foundation for its network security platform and contains App-ID, User-ID, and Content-ID. PAN-OS performs the core functions of its platform, while also providing the networking, security, and management functions needed for implementation. The PAN-OS networking functions include dynamic routing, switching, high availability, and VPN support, which enables deployment into a range of networking environments. PAN-OS also includes attack protection capabilities, such as blocking invalid or malformed packets, IP defragmentation, TCP reassembly, and network traffic normalization. The Company also offers, such as application traffic management, solution design and planning, configuration, and firewall migration. Its education services provide classroom-style training and are primarily delivered through its partners.

The Company competes with Cisco, Juniper, Intel, IBM, HP, Check Point Software, Fortinet and Sourcefire.

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By Tim Beyers]

  Finally, shares of Palo Alto Networks (NYSE: PANW  ) fell after the company released weaker-than-expected guidance. Management expects $0.06 a share in adjusted profits on $100 million to $106 million in revenue in the current quarter. Wall Street had been hoping for $0.07 and $113.7 million, respectively, from the cloud security specialist.

• [By MARKETWATCH]

  SAN FRANCISCO (MarketWatch) -- Palo Alto Networks Inc. (PANW) shares climbed as much as 7% in after-hours trading Monday after the network-security company said it acquired privately held Morta Security. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed. In a statement, Palo Alto Networks said Morta specializes in technology used to detect network threats. The deal comes three days after Palo Alto rival FireEye Inc. (FEYE) said it would acquire security technology company Mandiant for about $1 billion.