The Mid Cap Watch List (Track at Marketocracy) lagged but the others gained significant ground.

Small Cap Watch List (Track at Marketocracy) was helped by Aeropostale (ARO) results. It gained 2.63% this week, compared with 0.66% for the S&P Small Cap and 0.74% for the Russell 2000. Since January 31, 2007 it has opened a total lead averaging 300 basis points compared to its peers.

The Mid Cap Watch List (Track at Marketocracy) only gained 0.28%, trailing the 0.73% gain by the S&P Midcap. Still, it leads by 1.64% since inception.

The Large Cap Watch List (Track at Marketocracy) got a boost from Sallie Mae’s (SLM) big rise on Friday. That helped it earn 1.6% for the week to easily beat the S&P 500’s 0.63%. Since inception it is leading by nearly 3%.

Finally, we continue to track our legacy (June 2006) all-cap watch list, which has had no changes made other than through corporate actions (buyouts, bankruptcies, etc.) It only gained 0.1% this week. More embarrassing, our generally bearish stance cost us this week as our personal portfolio actually lost 0.1%.

With the end of the first quarter approaching, it is time to adjust the names in our Watch Lists. We will price all the new lists as of the close on Friday, March 30. Today we present our planned updates to the Large Cap Watch List (Track at Marketocracy).

Though less than the Small Cap Watch List and Mid Cap Watch List (Track at Marketocracy), there was still relatively high turnover in this list. 14 of the original 33 names made the cut for the new list (which was trimmed to just 26 names.) Part of the reason for the turnover was to reduce overlap between the lists. One third of the Mid Cap Watch List (Track at Marketocracy) names appear on each of the Small Cap and Large Cap Watch List (Track at Marketocracy)s, but there is no longer any overlap between small and large.
So without further ado, the names on the chopping block from the previous list are:

3M (MMM); Continental (CTTAY.PK); Mitsui (MITSY); Anheuser-Busch (BUD); ConocoPhillips (COP); Helix Energy (HELX); IndyMac Bancorp (NDE - Annual Report); Barr Pharmaceutical (BRL - Annual Report); Quest Diagnostics (DGX); Public Storage (PSA); ITT Educational Services (ESI); Equifax (EFX); Rent-a-Center (RCII); Kroger (KR); Ricoh (RICOY); First Data Corp. (FDC); Expeditors International (EXPD); and Keyspan (KSE).

The new list is:

Large-cap Watch List member Sallie Mae, which has long benefited from government benevolence, fell 9% yesterday when investors realized that political favors can be both granted and taken away.
Sallie Mae blasts Bush budget cuts: Financial News - Yahoo! Finance

“The cuts proposed today by the president to the private-sector student lending program, which currently serves 80 percent of all student borrowers, would have far-reaching consequences for students and taxpayers,” Sallie Mae said in a statement.

Not to mention the other 95% of the chairman’s stockholdings.

SLM Corporation announced that Albert L. Lord, chairman, sold 400,000 shares of SLM common stock, less than 5 percent of his holdings, on the open market in transactions that were completed last week.

Those struggling to pay for education take note: despite the hit to his remaining wealth, Lord’s sale last week allowed him to net $1.6 million more than it would have this week, enough to cover 53 student-years at Harvard.

We asked, but no one answered. So we are taking our own counsel and breaking our Watch List into three portfolios: Small Cap, Mid Cap and Large Cap. Each will be tracked against the relevant S&P index going forward from their collective inception date of January 31 (priced at the close of market trading that day.)

For your viewing pleasure, the Large Cap Watch List (Track at Marketocracy) (to be measured against the S&P 500) follows.

Astute observers will notice less overlap between this watch list and the names in the Small Cap Watch List and Mid Cap Watch List. This was not for lack of overlap, as the smallest S&P 500 name has a market capitalization of $600 million, which would allow for complete overlap with the Mid Caps if we chose. Instead we selected an arbitrary low of $2 billion for large-cap names, which cuts off five names that are actually in the S&P 500.
In addition, we will provide a “quick and dirty” analysis of each name, with a goal of one such analysis per day. As the name implies, the quick and dirty analysis will be incomplete. We are hoping you will join in the debate and fill the gaps in our analysis.