Are you looking for stability in a down market? whether you come across Merck & Co. (NYSE: MRK), you found it!. Yes, I have been a Merck cheerleader the past few years and I think it is one of the safe havens (how daring of me) for 2008. In fact, the large pharmaceutical companies have traditionally been safe havens when the stock market is under stress.

As I type absent nowadays, the market is down again, no it’s up, no it’s down — It finally ended higher with a nice gain, but Merck has been going only up, closing nowadays at $60.50. The stock could actually trade horizontally that year, or

offer only a slight gain by the year. Given the negativity in the market, that might be just fine when you add in Merck’s dividend.

Below is Merck’s five-year chart, which indicates the real date to buy was during the height of the Vioxx scandal in the fall of 2004, although you would have done fine nearly any day in the past three years. The stock has not fully regained its past glory but it is heading there.

Continue reading Chasing Value: Merck is holding up just fine

Original post by Sheldon Liber

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