Father's Day is a special occasion for many of us, a day to show our daddies how much we love them. We give dad some extra attention that day and usually also a present that could make him happy. Kiplinger.com has an interesting idea -- one that I really like -- for a Father's Day present you may want to consider: Find a good stock that could bring him a lot of money.

Let's look at some of the companies Kiplinger's Anne Kates Smith believes would be good options this year:

• O'Reilly Automotive (NASDAQ: ORLY) is an auto parts retailer that is facing weak demand as a result of soaring crude oil prices. However, analysts believe the company's strategy to buy CSK Auto will bring a lot of national success. ORLY is expected to show earnings of $1.76 per share this year and $2.02 next year.
• Stanley Works (NYSE: SWK), headquartered in New Britain, Conn., has the advantage of being one of only two companies offering a complete line of hand tools for consumers. The company focuses its performance on both its industrial tool division and a security business. Analysts forecast a profit of $4.18 this year, and $4.63 a share for next year.

Some investors shy away from small stocks, thinking they are too volatile and risky. But BusinessWeek takes a look at such stocks and finds some that could offer a lot of potential for growth.

It can be hard to find small companies that have great growth potential. Since most Wall Street analysts ignore smaller companies, it is often tough for investors to find the research that they need in their selection process, so they have to rely on their own research in order to find that perfect small cap stock.

One thing to look for when examining small cap stocks is a long and established track record. The downside to this approach is that these stocks are not going to be the next "big thing" and bring you huge profits in the short run. These stocks are the ones that typically serve a niche market, and perform that service successfully. While these will not make you rich overnight, they are fairly reliable companies you can look to for nice and steady returns. If you are the type of investor who likes to buy and hold, these are the small cap stocks for you.

In case you haven't noticed it, oil prices are surging, and the impact of these high prices is not going unfelt by the major airlines. Today, Europe's largest airline, Air France-KLM, stated what most of us already knew... it's not going to be a pretty year for the company's bottom line.

During its fiscal fourth quarter the airline swung to a loss of $853.81 million. During the same period last year the company was able to show a profit of $44 million.

The current surge in oil prices (which hit $135 earlier today), definitely played a role in the weak quarter, but were not the main culprit in the hefty loss. Most of the loss was due to $834 million after-tax provision due to a European and U.S. investigation into the air-cargo industry.

Shares of video game retailer Gamestop Corp (NYSE: GME) are getting shot down over 10% in premarket trading despite the company's record first quarter earnings.

So let's take a look at the numbers. Earnings per share came in at 37 cents for the quarter, two cents above the 35 cents that analysts had been expecting to see. At 37 cents per share, the company showed a pretty remarkable 151.4% earnings growth from the same period last year.

Revenue figures were also very respectable for the company, with a reported $1.813 billion (a 41.8% year over year increase), and well above the $1.72 billion estimate. Same-store sales got a boost of 27.1%, and if you take a look at new videogame software growth, that figure is an amazing 72%.

Some investors shy away from low priced stocks., but Rick Aristotle Munarriz thinks some stocks under $10 have nice growth potential. Here's his list of five such stocks to consider.

• Alvarion Ltd. (NASDAQ: ALVR) is currently at $8.98; its development trajectory looks impressive if we take into account the fact that it has gained 53% over the past two months. In addition, its quarterly earnings results and its cash-rich balance sheet point to further growth.
• Sirius Satellite Radio Inc. (NASDAQ: SIRI), currently at $2.72, is showing a lot of potential as its subscriber base continues to increase, while reducing its quarterly losses. Munarriz also cites the company's advantages tied to its pending merger with competitor XM Satellite Radio (NASDAQ: XMSR).
• Builders FirstSource Inc. (NASDAQ: BLDR) is currently at $7.48, down from $23 two years ago. Despite the fact that the company's quarterly earnings numbers weren't so good, BLRD was able to gain market share and is nicely positioned for a recovery in the next couple of years.
• Internet Brands Inc. (NASDAQ: INET), currently at $6.48, is seen as a good investment in the current dot-com world. Last week's $1.8 billion decision by CBS Corp. (NYSE: CBS) to acquire CNET Networks (NASDAQ: CNET) could be a sign that we should consider Internet Brands and its high traffic volume. Internet Brands has several pages that have high advertising potential, and should see this pay off in the future, or lead to a possible buyout by one of the major players.
• Natuzzi (NYSE: NTZ) is currently trading at $3.77. The company is facing some trouble related to its declining revenue and profit, but it is has the advantage of a lot of cash on its balance sheet.

Shares of agricultural equipment maker Deere & Co. (NYSE: DE) have been plunging in early trading more than 6% despite posting a rise for its second-quarter profit, as its earnings per share were a bit shy of analysts' estimates. In addition, the company warned about further higher costs threats.

For the quarter, the world's largest manufacturer of agricultural machinery reported that its profit surged 22% to $763.5 million, lifted by soaring crop prices that increased international demand for agricultural equipment. The company posted earnings of $1.74 a share, slightly missing analysts' predictions for earnings of $1.75 per share in the quarter.

The agricultural equipment maker also announced a respectable 18% jump in revenues to $8.1 billion. Revenue during the period was helped by a 47% increase in overseas sales that benefited from the weak U.S. dollar. Analysts had forecast a lower revenue of $7.6 billion, according to Reuters Estimates.

Most of us would be thrilled to invest in a stock that doubles our money, but it certainly isn't easy to find these stocks. According to data provider Capital IQ, in the last year only 1.4% of 6,700 stocks trading on the U.S. exchanges were able to double their price.

BusinessWeek started hunting some of these potentially great stocks by asking fund managers to choose those firms expected to provide 100% returns in the next few years. Of course, the resulting list is by no means a sure thing, since major factors such as the ongoing credit crisis and challenging market conditions could affect results in unpredictable ways.

But let's look at some of the strategies used when picking high-potential stocks.

Mary Lisanti, portfolio manager at the Adams Harkness Small Cap Growth Fund, focuses on young companies in the small-cap segment. She points to stocks like Rubicon Technology (NASDAQ: RBCN) and Titan Machinery Inc. (NASDAQ: TITN), saying that investors can have a big advantage when they recognize potential before the market does.

Nissan Motor Corp. (NASDAQ: NSANY), Japan's third-largest automaker, announced this morning higher fourth quarter profit, but forecast a decline in profit for the current year, blaming an unfavorable rising yen and soaring material costs.

Nissan Motor announced that its profit during the quarter jumped 67% to 137.6 billion yen ($1.3 billion). And its income figures were definitely something to cheer about. During its fourth quarter last year, the company had a profit of 82.2 billion yen. Excluding one-time "fifth-quarter" numbers, the company's earnings figures would have showed a surge of 95%.

Despite the positive results, the automaker isn't optimistic about its future earnings and issued a gloomy outlook. The company expects net income for the current year to drop 30% to 340 billion yen ($3.3 billion), which is below the 368 billion yen that analysts at Factset Research predicted. Nissan cited unfavorable currency exchange, higher commodity and energy prices, and increased material expenses.

I know that what you probably wanted to hear most is that the economy's slowdown is at an end so that some of your beaten-down stocks could enjoy a nice recovery. When the stock markets started declining towards the end of last year, SmartMoney tells us that analysts began to place bets on when we might see stocks rebound. Back then, many fund managers had expected a rally in the second half of 2008.

The Federal Reserve's decision to slash interest rates several times certainly gave a temporary boost to stocks -- not enough for a long-term rally, though. Daily concerns such as the deep housing slump and the rising inflation today give the impression that a second-half comeback is but a dream; it that would be quite hard to accomplish.

While analysts on Wall Street mostly believe a long-term rally is not too realistic now, they believe a moderate boost, stemming from the Fed's rate cuts and the $117 billion in tax rebates going into banks' accounts, is likely. On the other hand, looking at corporate profits, Citigroup analysts believe that predictions related to stocks' earnings figures are too high when taking the challenging market conditions into account.

The world's third largest music company, Warner Music Group Corp. (NYSE: WMG), reported this morning a wider second quarter loss and suspended a quarterly dividend to strengthen its balance sheet.

Warner Music posted a quarterly loss of $37 million, dragged down by higher costs and lower compact disc sales. Analysts had expected a loss of 12 cents per share, and were disappointed to see the company report a loss of 25 cents per share.

Warner's quarterly revenue rose only 2% to $800 million compared with $784 million a year ago. The company attributed the revenue decline to its recorded-music segment whose sales climbed only 0.6% due to consumers' preferences for digital music. However, the drop in revenue could have been even worse if the recording company hadn't benefited from the weak dollar, Warner stated. Analysts expected revenue of $780 million, according to Thomson Reuters.

It wasn't that long ago that Wall Street was in love with Crocs, Inc (NASDAQ: CROX), the maker of the trendy slippers that took the world by storm last year. After going on a tear for most of 2007, the stock started to break down last November, and has been in a tail spin for the past 5 months.

The company is going to be reporting its first quarter numbers tomorrow after the market close, and all signs are pointing to yet another troublesome quarter for the company. Earnings.com is showing Wall Street estimates of 10 cents a share, but that number does not really hold too much water after the company announced a much weaker forecast last month in its preliminary release.

Last month, CROX shocked Wall Street when it said that it expected to see a 5 cent per share loss in the quarter, and revenues falling somewhere between $195 and $200 million. After that news came out, the already troubled stock took a serious nose dive, and gave up around 40% of its value.

Shares of consumer goods giant Sara Lee (NYSE: SLE) have been taking a beating today after the company failed to meet analyst estimates for its fiscal third quarter.

At first glance, it looked like a fantastic quarter for the company, as profit rose by a remarkable 82%, but things start to look less than rosy once we take a closer look. Analysts had been expecting to see the company show earnings during the quarter of 24 cents a share, and were disappointed to see the company come in below this, with only 22 cents a share.

This is the second quarter in a row in which the company posted weaker than expected earnings, and is quickly erasing the progress that the stock has been making since the beginning of March.

Shares of the online auction site eBay, Inc. (NASDAQ: EBAY) have been surging today after positive remarks from Banc of America Securities analyst Brian J. Pitz, who stated that the company is on track for a "solid" first quarter to the year.

Pitz made his remarks after analyzing the company's recent proprietary listings and conversion rate tracking data. As a result of his findings, Pitz gives the stock a price target of $38, and lifted his revenue forecast for the quarter from $2.03 billion up to $2.08 billion. This is slightly higher than the $2.06 billion that Wall Street is expecting to see, and as a result shares of the e-commerce giant have surged 5% today to $30.96, and hit a high earlier in the session up at $31.21.

eBay has been in the news a lot lately, but for the most part, it has not been positive. The company has been fighting off speculation that a seller's strike late last month that extended into the first week of March had had any material impact on the site's listing numbers. Some have argued that the strike led to a 13% drop in product listings, but eBay has adamantly denied any impact what-so-ever, and instead has insisted that a promotion that ran right before the strike had artificially inflated product listing numbers that were used to compute the strike's effectiveness.

For months now the dreaded "R" word has been floating around, and while most analysts are quick to point out that the technical definition of a recession has not been reached at this point, the signs are definitely pointing to a looming recession on the horizon. Now, there are a large selection of economists who are stating that the economy has already slid into a recession.

According to a poll by the Wall Street Journal, 70% of 51 economists who were polled over the past week are now reporting that the economy has moved into a recession.

Before we move ahead, let's take a look at the technical definition of a recession:

In macroeconomics, a recession is a decline in a country's gross domestic product (GDP), or negative real economic growth, for two or more successive quarters of a year

For more earnings forecasts, see Peter Cohan's Earnings expectations for 10 banks tell a mixed story.

Thomson Financial expects Citigroup (NYSE: C) to lose $0.97 when it announces its fourth-quarter results on January 15th. That's bad compared to the same period in 2006, when it earned $0.70.

Citigroup is a New York-based bank whose segments include Global Consumer Group, Corporate and Investment Banking (CIB), Global Wealth Management and Alternative Investments (AI). In the last year, its revenues were $117.9 billion and its net income totaled $18.5 billion. Its stock has fallen 48% in the last year, and it now trades at a P/E of 7.5.

Citigroup has a record of beating estimates. In the second quarter of 2007, it beat the estimate by 8.8% and in the third quarter it beat by 6.8%. My hunch is that Citigroup will lose more than expected.

Peter Cohan is president of Peter S. Cohan & Associates. He also teaches management at Babson College and edits The Cohan Letter. He owns Citigroup shares.