5 Best Prefered Stocks For 2016

5 Best Prefered Stocks For 2016: Amedisys Inc(AMED)

Amedisys, Inc., a health care company, provides home health and hospice services primarily in the United States. It operates in two segments, Home Health and Hospice. The Home Health segment offers various services in the homes of individuals who may be recovering from an illness, injury, or surgical procedure. This segment?s services include skilled nursing, home health aides, physical and occupational therapy, speech therapy, and medical social services; and chronic care clinical programs for patients with chronic diseases, such as cardiovascular, respiratory, diabetes, behavioral health, rehabilitative, and medical surgical conditions. The Hospice segment provides care that is designed to offer comfort and support for those who are facing a terminal illness, such as heart disease, pulmonary disease, dementia, Alzheimer?s, HIV/AIDS, or cancer. As of December 31, 2011, the company owned and operated 440 Medicare-certified home health care centers, 87 Medicare-certified ho spice care centers, and 2 hospice inpatient units in 41 states within the United States, the District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico. Amedisys, Inc. was founded in 1982 and is headquartered in Baton Rouge, Louisiana.

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By Roberto Pedone]

  Another stock that looks poised to trigger a big breakout trade is Amedisys (AMED), which is engaged in delivering personalized health care services to patients and their families. This stock has been on fire so far in 2013, with shares up a whopping 61%.

  If you look at the chart for Amedisys, you'll notice that this stock has been trending sideways inside of a consolidation chart pattern right above its 50-day moving average at $16.92, with shares moving between $16.04 on the downside and $18.70 on the upside. Shares of AMED are now starting to spike higher right above its 50-day, and it's quickly moving within range of triggering a big breakout trade above the upper-end of its! recent range.

  Traders should now look for long-biased trades in AMED if it manages to break out above some near-term overhead resistance levels at $18.05 to its 52-week high at $18.70 a share with high volume. Look for a sustained move or close above those levels with volume that hits near or above its three-month average action of 444,954 shares. If that breakout triggers soon, then AMED will set up to enter new 52-week-high territory, which is bullish technical price action. Some possible upside targets off that breakout are $25 to $27 a share.

  Traders can look to buy AMED off any weakness to anticipate that breakout and simply use a stop that sits right below its 50-day at $16.92 a share or below more near-term support at $16.62 a share. One can also buy AMED off strength once it clears those breakout levels with volume and then simply use a stop that sits a comfortable percentage from your entry point.

• [By Sean Williams]

  Last week, we saw home-health sector stocks like Amedisys (NASDAQ: AMED  ) and Gentiva Health Solutions (NASDAQ: GTIV  ) get clobbered because the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services recommended a 1.5% reduction in Medicare reimbursements each year between 2014 and 2017. With Amedisys and Gentiva reliant on Medicare for more than 80% and 90% of their revenue, respectively, it could put hospitals that rely on government reimbursements in a growth bind.

• [By Brendan Conway]

  That zipping sound you hear is home-health providerAmedisys‘ (AMED) 24% surge on news thatprivate-equity giant Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co.has a stake of more than 8% in the stock.

  CRT Capital analyst Sheryl Skolnick, a critic of company management, upgrades to “fair value” this morning and essentially tells clients to get out of KKR’s way, since the firm could end up ushering in a new board and management:

  There are times when this analyst will ‘take on’ sharehold! ers with ! differing views and there are times when she knows, from long experience, not to even think about it. This is one of the latter times ….

  We know that when activists get involved, strange and interesting things happen, even (especially?) with entrenched managements. For the record, we think it unlikely that this part of KKR will take AMED private: filing a 13-D that almost surely takes the stock up would be that act of amateurs, in our view, not the act of a savvy firm like KKR. Some may conclude from the language of the 13-D that KKR may not actually become active. We reviewed it and found it nearly identical to other activists’ initial statements: then things changed. Thus, a new Board and management does seem likely and is indeed the strategy we advocated in our 4/3/13 report and THAT is the root cause of our upgrade.

  But for the 13-D we would NOT have upgraded. Indeed, we were in the midst of preparing a strong reiteration of our view that AMED cannot be fixed by this CEO and his Board. We reiterate that view here and strongly suspect that any activist likely has or will reach that same conclusion.

• [By Sean Williams]

  What: Shares of home health providers Amedisys (NASDAQ: AMED  ) , Gentiva Health Services (NASDAQ: GTIV  ) , andLHC Group (NASDAQ: LHCG  ) swooned as much as 28%, 20%, and 15%, respectively, following a public proposal by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, or CMS, late yesterday that in-home health care reimbursements be cut by 1.5% in 2014.

source from Top Stocks To Buy For 2015:http://www.topstocksforum.com/5-best-prefered-stocks-for-2016.html