From a recent Mad Money show:"No, this doesn't fit my criteria. It's just not strong enough. No thank you."

Other stocks, some of them well liked, were considered too pricey: Wells Fargo, Goldman Sachs (GS), Apple (AAPL), SunTrust Banks (STI), which last week cut its dividend by 30%, and Wal-Mart Stores (WMT). Wal-Mart has held up better than many retail issues; at a recent $54 it trades near the midpoint of its 52-week range of $42.50 to $63.85, and yields 1.7%.

growth,conservative

Seems like the bank-buying spree has begun in earnest and all of the regionals could now go: Comerica (CMA), First Horizon (FHN), National City (NCC), Suntrust (STI). They can all be bought by Bank of America (BAC), U.S. Bancorp (USB) -- still not heard from -- Goldman Sachs (GS) and JPMorgan (JPM).

2.9

6.1%

financial needs should rise on econ. upswing

Options action suggest that investors are making bets to the downside, but they’re small moves. Investors seem to think these stocks could drift lower through the first week in September but they’re both solid banks.

Q: Give us some shorts, please.

A: Let's start with the obvious. You can't have financial institutions levered 30-to-1, which I think is the case in Europe, or 25-to-1, which I think is the case in the States, and expect nothing bad to happen. So, we have been short the banks for a long time. And the brokers. And the mortgage lenders and mortgage guarantors. We typically short stocks, not ETFs or indexes. We've been short Bank of America [BAC], JPMorgan Chase [JPM] Citigroup [C}, Goldman Sachs [GS], Merrill Lynch [MER], Lehman Brothers [LEH], Morgan Stanley [MS], SunTrust [STI], Wachovia [WB], Washington Mutual [WM], Capital One [COF]. There's hardly a financial name that we aren't short.

2

Sun Trust has a long way to go down still. Highly exposed to Florida markets

Headed for book value of $51.45