In his 'Master Trading' portfolio, Bernie Schaeffer uses fundamental, technical and sentiment metrics to select trades. Here's a trio of ideas from Schaeffer's Investment Research.

"I have initiated a long position in Office Depot (NYSE: ODP). Price action for ODP has been strong, with the equity gaining more than 108% year-to-date.

"Recently, the equity pulled back to its 20-day moving average. There is heavy out-of-the-money put open interest for ODP. An unwinding of the short positions related to this open interest could provide a tailwind for the stock.

TheStreet.com's Jim Cramer says stocks connected to the sector will take it on the chin if the housing index falls further.

A perusal of the charts this weekend shows something surprising: The weakest group out there has been the homebuilders for several weeks now. KB Home (NYSE: KBH) (Cramer's Take), D.R. Horton (NYSE: DHI) (Cramer's Take), Lennar (NYSE: LEN) (Cramer's Take), and Toll Brothers (NYSE: TOL) (Cramer's Take) have simply been a horror show. What's going on here? How can these stocks be so dangerous when mortgage rates have crashed through 5%, the level that every banker I talk to says mortgages jump off the table and refinancings rush to be done.

What's going on? This group's tracking more than just mortgage rates. It's tracking employment and news flow and both are terrible.

Here are some highlights from last week's earnings coverage from BloggingStocks:

• Activision Blizzard Inc. (NASDAQ: ATVI) shares rose after it reaffirmed its full-year earnings and sales outlook.
• Automatic Data Processing Inc. (NASDAQ: ADP) will have low double-digit EPS growth, predicts one analyst.
• AutoZone Inc. (NYSE: AZO) posted a decline in earnings but a small rise in sales, sending shares lower.
• Bed Bath & Beyond Inc. (NASDAQ: BBBY) posted better-than-expected Q2 earnings and higher revenue.
• CarMax Inc. (NYSE: KMX) rallied to a new 52-week high after topping analysts' Q2 earnings expectations.
• Carnival Corp. (NYSE: CCL) reported better-than-expected Q3 results and raised its full-year guidance.

TheStreet.com's Jim Cramer does not agree with one group's idea the housing market will be hit by a glut of foreclosed homes.

Until last night, when I thought of "Amherst" I thought of a school that my eldest daughter debated applying to. Not anymore. Nope. Now there's a new Amherst in town -- Amherst Securities. Last night this firm, which trades mortgage-backed securities, became the new expert on housing when it issued a report saying that we were going to have another leg down because the market is about to get hit by 7 million foreclosed homes.

Downbeat. Horrible. Sell the homebuilders. Sell the banks. Huge wave of foreclosures coming.

Yeah.

Got it.

Today was a weak day even before the leading economic indicators brought a disappointment. The dollar was strong ahead of the FOMC meeting decision this week, where the Fed is expected to give less free money but will likely hold rates firm. The good news is that despite a negative news bias from companies, the drops were not as hard as they could have been.

Here were today's unofficial closing bell levels:

Dow 9,778.93 -41.27 (-0.42%)
S&P 500 1,064.71 -3.59 (-0.34%)
Nasdaq 2,138.04 +5.18 (0.24%)

Top Analyst Upgrades/Downgrades
Top Trader Alerts

Shares of homebuilder Lennar Corp. (NYSE: LEN) have been taking a beating today following weaker than expected earnings for its fiscal third quarter.

Traders have pushed shares of the company down over 5% after the company reported that it had lost 97 cents per share for the period. This was a much wider loss than the 46 cents per share that analysts had been expecting to see from the Miami based company.

Much of the focus this week will no doubt be on the FOMC meeting on interest rates and the subsequent decision, as well as on the G-20 meeting in Pittsburgh, were the agenda will include bonuses for bank executives among other things.

Things will be fairly quiet again on the earnings front as the next earnings season has yet to ramp up. However, analysts surveyed by Thomson Reuters do have high hopes for a handful of companies that will release results this week.

TheStreet.com's Jim Cramer says don't heed the pundits -- allow yourself to believe things are improving.

Skeptical, or impossible? That's how I am posing the dilemma of the "pull through" argument whether it involves Ford (NYSE: F) (Cramer's Take) and "Cash for Clunkers" or Hovnanian (NYSE: HOV) (Cramer's Take), Lennar (NYSE: LEN) (Cramer's Take), Toll (NYSE: TOL) (Cramer's Take), KB Home (NYSE: KBH) and Pulte (NYSE: PHM) (Cramer's Take) and the $8,000 tax credit.

Right now any time there is a stimulus program of any sort, the pundits/media/money managers all decide the most important single issue isn't what it will do to the numbers, or whether it will work at all, but what will it do to the "pull through." How much of future sales will it "steal"?

Lennar (NYSE: LEN) has had one of the most impressive rebounds of all the home builders. The stock has been up as much as 340% since bottoming last November.

Wall Street's current consensus for Lennar's earnings this year is a loss of $2.88. In my opinion, that's too low. I think Lennar will have little trouble surprising Wall Street analysts later this year.

Lennar is a good momentum buy.

The past few years haven't been what you might call a happy time for shares of home building stocks. Consider that the Homebuilders Exchange-Traded Fund (NYSE: XHB) plunged from $40 per share in early 2007 to just $8 per share earlier this year.

Since March, however, things have improved. There are signs that the housing market is getting back on its feet -- or at least, declining less slowly. Existing home sales recently registered their biggest gain in more than a decade. Seasonally-adjusted single-family building permits are up 27% since bottoming in March, while single-family housing starts have increased five straight months and are up 36% since March.

Most investors got slammed last year, down 50% or more in their investments. Didn't matter if they owned stocks or real estate, they got hammered. Many have to start over. And if they're near retirement, it's scary. Years of patient investing wiped out, gains that were made over a long time disappeared frighteningly fast.

But now it's time to begin fresh, to rebuild. What's the safest way to regain some or all of the losses without suffering another wipeout?

TheStreet.com's Jim Cramer says the presumption remains that we're doing badly. I disagree and will place my bets.

As a bull who feels like he's "won" of late, I am about as sure of myself as a gambler who has just had a couple of blackjacks, meaning that I expect to be given a 16 any week now. That doesn't mean you can't play out of a 16, especially when the dealer's got something similar. It does mean you have to be at the table.

I use the analogy because there's something about the "hotness" of this market after the employment number that flies in the face of what could happen if the big gains in the economy truly are all government and not private sector, especially if you look at the charts, which reveal an overextended and expensive market. The charts say we're about to stall out, and it bothers me because they've said that all the way up. And it bothers me because literally everyone I respect in this business -- except Steve Leuthold -- has emerged with a consensus view that the economy without stimulation would be near collapse, and even with stimulation will collapse anyway because of all the debt taken down to stimulate.

TheStreet.com's Jim Cramer says if you wait for market conditions to reach perfection, you'll be waiting a long time.

You know what? I am going to wait until I am sure housing has turned before I buy the homebuilders like Lennar (NYSE: LEN) (Cramer's Take) and Pulte (NYSE: PHM) (Cramer's Take). I am going to wait until the foreclosures peak before I buy Bank of America (NYSE: BAC) (Cramer's Take) and Wells Fargo (NYSE: WFC) (Cramer's Take).

I am going to wait until unemployment goes down before I buy 3M (NYSE: MMM) (Cramer's Take) and Disney (NYSE: DIS) (Cramer's Take) and IBM (NYSE: IBM) (Cramer's Take) and Caterpillar (NYSE: CAT) (Cramer's Take).

Analyst upgrades:

• Jefferies upgraded Autodesk (NASDAQ: ADSK) to Buy from Hold after the firm's channel checks indicated the company's business is stabilizing. Jefferies raised its target on shares to $27 from $20.
• Citigroup upgraded Veeco (NASDAQ: VECO) to Buy from Hold on expectations LED order momentum will continue and cost discipline will help margin leverage. Citi raised its target on shares to $24 from $8.
• Deutsche Bank upgraded Domtar (NYSE: UFS) to Buy from Hold on expectations earnings will improve meaningfully over the next year. The firm keeps a $24 price target on the stock.
• Varian (NASDAQ: VARI) was upgraded to Equal Weight from Underweight at Barclays.
• Air Products (NYSE: APD) was upgraded to Overweight from Neutral at JPMorgan.
• U.S. Steel (NYSE: X) was upgraded to Buy from Neutral at Goldman.

Lennar Corp. (NYSE: LEN - option chain) shares are rising today with other homebuilders this morning after the Mortgage Bankers Association said U.S. mortgage applications rose 4.3% last week, helped by lower interest rates. If you think that the stock won't fall by too much in the coming months, then now could be a good time to look at a bullish hedged trade on LEN.

LEN opened this morning at $9.01. So far today the stock has hit a low of $8.97 and a high of $9.37. As of 11:50, LEN is trading at $9.00 up 0.31 (3.5%). The chart for LEN looks neutral and S&P gives LEN a neutral 3 STARS (out of 5) hold ranking.