MEMPHIS, Tenn. (September 25, 2006) – The Focus List of Morgan Keegan & Company, Inc. ranked first among the recommended stock lists of 12 leading national and regional brokerage firms with the best performance returns for the six months and year ended June 30, 2006, according to Zacks Investment Research, Inc.
In "Who’s the World Champ?", an article published today in Barron's, Morgan Keegan's Focus List posted a 35.35% return for the year ended June 30 and a 21.15% gain for the first half of 2006. Morgan Keegan substantially outperformed the other brokerage firms including Citigroup Smith Barney, A.G. Edwards and Raymond James and the Standard & Poor's 500 Composite for the same periods.
"Our Focus List benefited from the strong performance of several of our stock picks in the consumer-discretionary, energy and industrial sectors as well as a healthy mix of small and mid-cap names," said Elkan Scheidt, chairman of Morgan Keegan's Focus Group and director of the firm's equity research department.
“Our success comes from our equity research analysts' in-depth knowledge of the industry sectors and companies, which definitely gives us a competitive edge," added Scheidt. "We look for quality companies with interesting stories that are not well-known to include on our Focus List, which typically features no more than 20 stocks.”
In 1988, Morgan Keegan created the Focus Group to make the firm's equity research more accessible for the individual investor through the firm’s Focus List of recommended stocks. The Focus Group includes representatives from the firm’s equity research department, equity strategy group, equity institutional sales department and private client group. To create the Focus List, the Group selects stocks that they believe have the best potential from the firm's coverage universe.
Zacks Investment Research, Inc., an independent research source for Barron's, tracks the stock recommendations of 12 major brokerage firms. The Zacks survey is intended to give investors an indication of how their portfolio would perform if investment professionals selected their stocks. Calculations for the survey take into account gains or losses, dividends and theoretical commissions of 1% on each trade. Beginning and end prices used are the official exchange closing prices on the date a focus list change is made. Zacks calculates the time-weighted monthly performance of focus lists on an equal-weighted basis. Monthly returns are then linked geometrically to produce quarterly and annual total return performance figures.
Contact: Gail Rimer
Morgan Keegan
901-524-4183
