July 7th - AIR SFD ANF

Cramer's first two picks were offensive play for next week and were PEP Pepsico Inc. and DNA Genentech Inc. Both to big and expensive.

His two defensive plays were AL Alcan Inc. and AIR AAR Corp.

AL is a bit too expensive for my taste on the shorting front trading at $47.75 and isn't getting much attention after hours.

AIR
Closing Price: $21.78
After Hours High and level off price: $22.25
Percent Increase: 2.2%
Trades on NYSE
Sector: Industrial Goods
Short %: 11.11%
Days to Cover: 7.8

AIR has been picked before by Cramer. View my post from the last time it was picked here. This is also very close to an ANGO no-short situation because it is trading exactly at today's high of $22.25 and on very light after hours trading. It is likely this will drop below $22.25 tonight before the close. The company also reports earnings on Wednesday the 12th so I am a bit on the cautious side after STJ stayed so strong before its earnings report.

Cramer's next segment featured SFD Smithfield Foods Inc.

Closing Price: $28.73
After Hours High: $29.17
Percent Increase at High: 1.5%
Price Level Off Point: $28.95
Percent Increase at Level Off Point: 0.8%
Trades on NYSE
Sector: Consumer Goods
Short %: 2.4%
Days to Cover: 3.7

Not a very exciting pick it seems with only a few trades after hours. On a big down day today in the market, this stock was up $0.31 or 1.09%. Less then a million shares traded daily on average, but today volume was about 1/3 higher than normal. I do see a big trade that happened this afternoon of over 300,000 shares (which accounts for the higher volume) and since this is an NYSE traded stock that trade has me a little concerned since the price went higher after that trade so hard to think it was a big short sale. Hard to say too much without seeing what might happen on Monday. We obviously need some more volume and more price increase to feel comfortable for a short. I will be on the look out for the big trades as well to see if that may influence the price action.

Cramer picked ANF Abercrombie & Fitch Co. as another value pick. He explained a situation where the company reported some poor same store sales that were below already low estimates and the stock went up. He claimed the reason it went up was because the owners of the stock are value investors who aren't worried about these reports and didn't sell on the news. The short sellers in the stock then panicked and covered their shorts because they didn't get the fallout that was expected, thus raising the price. Having said all that, the stock trades at $55 and change and is too expensive to short off the Cramer recommendation in my opinion. And if what Cramer says is true, and there aren't many sellers and some good upside potential in the stock then there is no sense joining the recently failed short sellers. The short % now is only 4%, but the stock has heavy institutional holders in the tune of 87% which could explain why there were not many sellers. I really don't think betting against the institutions that have this big a hold on the stock is a great idea.