UnitedHealth's stock has been hammered along with other managed-care shares. A rebound in earnings could help it rally into the low 50s from the current high 20s.

Bank of Nova Scotia's Toronto-listed shares could rise to C$36 in the next two years, from C$30. Meanwhile, investors will be collecting a fat 6%-plus dividend yield.

NetApp's growth should be 10%-15% this year and possibly 15%-20% in 2010. That merits a better P/E multiple than 12.7. An analyst puts the stock's value at least 25% higher.

With shares off 72% since April and trading at 8.9 times 2009 profits, the lowest multiple in at least two decades, bulls argue GE can withstand expected cancellations on its order book. Its troubled GE Capital unit recently sold 30-year paper without a government guarantee at 7% -- one sign its debt is still good in the bond market. GE shares could slide another 20% from Friday's 11.10, but then, "so could the rest of the market," says M. Kevin Flynn of Avalon Asset Management. For longer-term investors, "a downside of two or three dollars and an upside of 20 or more -- we can live with that."

Applied Signal shares had climbed 300% over three years after the Sept. 11 attacks, but have since settled down. At 17.50, they fetch 23 times 2009 per-share profits that analysts peg, conservatively, at 75 cents. That looks expensive at first, but Applied Signal has nearly $4 a share in cash and a 3% yield. An aggressive restructuring of its employee stock purchase plan also pushed much of that expense -- roughly $0.30 a share -- into 2008 and should help margins this year, Cinnamond says. Given the swell in all communications, Applied Signal could expand from surveillance into, say, cyber security. And, while takeovers can't be count on, a large defense contractor may one day plunk down a premium for this niche specialist.

We stand by our thesis that the company offers an extraordinary levered play on any rise in bond and other credit-market prices. For the fourth quarter, its book value per share finished below our estimate of around $30, coming in at $28.53. But that number is weighed down by temporary, unrealized mark-to-market losses in its investment accounts reflecting mayhem in the bond market. If these get reversed, the book value would jump above $50 a share. Fourth-quarter book value excluding these temporary losses stood at $51.69. Moreover, lots of the Hartford's bad numbers reported following last Thursday's close reflected temporary factors rather than fundamental rot. For example, its life operation's risk-based capital level came in 385% of minimum levels rather than the 535% the company previously guided to. Yet the bulk of that difference came from Hartford's decision to infuse only $1.5 billion of the new capital raised in October from Allianz in its life unit rather than the full $2.5 billion. Fourth-quarter core earnings would've hit consensus estimates of around $1.30 save for some unexpected goodwill write-downs and higher than expected losses in its alternative investment portfolio. With all that, UBS analyst Andrew Kligerman still foresees operating earnings of $5.96 a share. We think his 12-month price target of 18 is too pessimistic.

Solar stocks are down 50% or more from last year's highs, but some may have further to fall. Among them: Energy Conversion Devices (ENER), the Michigan-based maker of thin-film solar modules that are less efficient than premium products like those of SunPower (SPWRA), but lower priced. While SunPower has been able to hold its pricing, other high-efficiency producers have lowered prices to the levels where customers had previously settled for products like Energy Conversion's. A General Motors facility in Spain that accounted for a hunk of Energy Conversion sales last year isn't going to be a repeat customer. At almost 26 bucks a share, the solar company carries a stock-market capitalization of $1 billion and a multiple of 17 times the optimistic consensus for the June 2009 fiscal year. On Monday, Energy Conversion reports on its December quarter and investors should listen closely to the company's outlook on prices.

Solar stocks are down 50% or more from last year's highs, but some may have further to fall. Among them: Energy Conversion Devices (ENER), the Michigan-based maker of thin-film solar modules that are less efficient than premium products like those of SunPower (SPWRA), but lower priced. While SunPower has been able to hold its pricing, other high-efficiency producers have lowered prices to the levels where customers had previously settled for products like Energy Conversion's. A General Motors facility in Spain that accounted for a hunk of Energy Conversion sales last year isn't going to be a repeat customer. At almost 26 bucks a share, the solar company carries a stock-market capitalization of $1 billion and a multiple of 17 times the optimistic consensus for the June 2009 fiscal year. On Monday, Energy Conversion reports on its December quarter and investors should listen closely to the company's outlook on prices.