Excel Maritime Carriers Ltd (EXM)

Hey everyone thanks for reading my blog. I hope all of you are still making money after a wild week in the markets.
Today I am going to be talking about Excel Maritime Carriers a company I found while scanning the list of top gainers the NYSE. Wednesday they had a great day up 5.49% for the day.
This company just came out with some great earnings on August 13th beating analyst estimates by a whopping 20.42%

What do they do?
Excel Maritime Carriers Ltd. (Excel) is a shipping company. The Company is a provider of worldwide sea borne transportation services for dry bulk cargo, including among others, iron ore, coal and grain (collectively referred to as major bulks), and steel products, fertilizers, cement, bauxite, sugar and scrap metal (collectively referred to as minor bulks). As of December 31, 2006, its fleet consisted of 17 dry bulk carriers (10 Panamax and seven Handymax vessels), representing a carrying capacity of approximately 1,005,000 dead weight tons. As of December 31, 2006, the average age of Excel’s vessels was 13.8 years. The Company’s fleet is managed by its wholly owned subsidiary, Maryville Maritime Inc. As of December 31, 2006, Excel owned a 75% interest in Oceanaut Inc., which was formed to acquire, through a merger, capital stock exchange, asset acquisition, stock purchase or other similar business combination, vessels or one or more operating businesses in the shipping industry.

Fundamental Quality?
I like to rate stocks on 3 different components, the first being fundamental strengh. A few things that stand out to me on this stock are. Year after year increase in sales, starting in 2002 at $16 million and steadily increasing to $141 million for the trailing twelve months. There EPS has steadily increased as well, going from $0.09 in 2002 to $2.60 in the trailing twelve months. Now looking at some key ratios we see that there Price/Sales ratio is pretty high at 6.57%, but considering the uptrend this stock has enjoyed its understandable. There current ratio comes in at 2.66%, this shows they should have plenty of cash to cover any debt obligations. There return on equity ratio in strong as well at 15.90%, this shows they are pretty efficient at reinvesting there earnings.

Current Operational Trends
The second category I like to rate a stock on is what I like to call Current Operational Trends. Or more simply, how strong is a company's most recent sales and EPS growth.
One way to gauge this is by using the sales for growth for the most recent quarter. For Excel its 39.7% compared to its peers in the industry there's is 74% higher. I also like to look at the EPS growth for the most recent quarter. For Excel that is a crazy 347% which is 90% than other company's in this industry.

Technical Strengh
The final aspect of a stock I like to look at is, Technical Strengh.

Taking a look at the chart we can see this stock has been in a serious uptrend for over a year and is closing at new highs just about everyday. The 50 day ma and the 200 day ma are both moving up, something I love to see. Volume in steadily increasing as well. This shows increasing strengh in the stock. If you would have picked up this stock 180 days ago you would have seen a 136.9% increase!

Based on the fundamental and technical strengh of this stock I am rating it a buy.

This Stock (EXM) Is Rated A Buy