Despite a weak overall market and a low 2% gain from the S&P/ASX 200 Index (ASX: XJO) (Index: ^AXJO) over the past year, there were a number of individual stocks that climbed remarkably.
Below are two that stuck out for me for separate reasons. Could these stock winners keep on winning into 2015?
— CSL Limited (ASX: CSL), the blood related medical product and vaccine developer set a solid pace of growth in financial year 2014 thanks in part to increased demand for its blood plasma products. New facilities in Melbourne and the U.S. are boosting collection and production. The stock is up 28% over the past twelve months, hitting a 52-week high of $89.07 in late December.
In 2015? The growth can continue for two big reasons. CSL just acquired the influenza vaccine business of pharmaceutical multinational Novartis, which will make the company the second largest influenza vaccine maker in the world.
Also, CSL is expanding its presence in the Chinese healthcare market. Last year saw a big surge in demand for albumin, used for stabilising patient blood pressure and for burn victim treatment. Demand is rising in China as healthcare needs grow in line with its urbanisation movement.
Trading at 26 times earnings, the stock may seem pricey. Yet with double-digit earnings growth forecast for the next several years, it's not incredibly expensive. You can always snap up shares after a pullback. CSL can keep going strong in 2015.
— Another strong performer was Newcrest Mining Limited (ASX: NCM) with a whopping 49% gain in the last twelve months. It was near multi-year lows in January 2014 when it looked like gold prices might keep heading down to US$1,000 an ounce.
The gold miner had $2.35 billion in asset write-downs in financial year 2014, which swamped its much smaller underlying net profit. The stock headed downward once more to around $8.60 a share in November.
Then gold began to rise, possibly brought on by concerns of the falling oil market. Newcrest took back its lost gains and recovered about 44% from then until now.
In 2015? Newcrest is not planning to produce much more than it did in financial year 2014. If gold continues to rally well above US$1,200 an ounce, the gold miner could climb higher from increased revenue. I'm not so confident that gold will rise appreciably more, so I wouldn't expect to see strong gains from Newcrest this year.
