3 Stocks That Blew the Market Away

Don't settle for ordinary quarterly reports.

I take a look at three companies that beat market expectations every week, for I believe that it's the biggest factor in whether a stock beats the market. Leaving Wall Street's pros with stunned expressions can be a good thing. It usually means that the companies have more in the tank than analysts figured. Capital appreciation typically follows.

Let's take a look at a few companies that humbled the pros over the past few trading days.

We can start with Apollo Group (NAS: APOL) . The company behind the University of Phoenix online campus posted a quarterly profit of $0.58 a share, well ahead of the $0.37 a share that the pros were projecting.

Unfortunately for Apollo, the bottom-line performance was still well short of the $0.83 a share that it scored on last year's report card for the same quarter. Apollo's report also didn't impress analysts who chimed in with concerns that Apollo will continue to be have difficulty building up its enrollments.

Red Hat (NYS: RHT) also bested the prognosticators. The Linux luminary saw its quarterly income climb 12% higher to $0.29 a share. Investors were bracing for earnings of only $0.27 a share. Red Hat capped off its fiscal year in fine fashion with a 21% top-line pop. Red Hat is now the first open-source software specialist to generate at least $1 billion in revenue for a single fiscal year.

Finally we have TIBCO Software (NAS: TIBX) on the quarterly report stage. The stock took a 6% hit on Friday after posting a profit of $0.20 a share, ahead of the $0.19 a share that analysts were aiming for and the $0.16 a share it served up a year earlier. It wasn't enough of a beat. Wall Street can be a pretty jaded lot in the near term.

Moving in the right direction
It's important to keep watching the companies that surpass expectations. Over time, it will be a lucrative experience for investors as the market rewards the overachievers. That's the kind of surprise that we look for in the Rule Breakers newsletter service. Want in? Check out a 30-day trial subscription. If that's not up your alley just yet, you can still check out a free special report detailing the next trillion-dollar revolution.

Either way, come back next week to learn about more stocks that blew the market away in the coming days.

If these three victors aren't enough, check out a new report that reveals three hidden winners in a booming niche that will only get bigger in the future. It's a free report, so check it out soon.

At the time thisarticle was published Motley Fool newsletter serviceshave recommended buying shares of TIBCO Software. The Motley Fool has adisclosure policy. We Fools may not all hold the same opinions, but we all believe thatconsidering a diverse range of insightsmakes us better investors. Try any of our Foolish newsletter servicesfree for 30 days.Longtime Fool contributor Rick Munarriz calls them as he sees them. He does not own shares in any of the stocks in this story. Rick is also part of theRule Breakersnewsletter research team, seeking out tomorrow's ultimate growth stocks a day early.

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