Those of you who subscribe to our web research service may have noticed this morning a few new and expanded sections of the web site. For those who have not seen them we encourage you to have a look and send us your feedback.

The first new page, or, actually, enhanced page, is the ‘Company Profile.’ We redesigned the existing ‘Profile’ page, reorganized some of its existing content and incorporated quite a few new elements. The ‘Company Profile’ page, available for every company covered by MarketGrader.com, can be reached by selecting the first option from the drop-down menu off the ‘Company’ link in the ‘Stock Analysis’ section of ‘StockGrader.’ At the top of the page you will find a complete description of the company’s business describing what it does, its products and, in some cases, some of the market segments in which it competes, among other general facts and company background information. Below it we have added a new information grid with items such as the stock’s 52-week range, the 50 and 200-day moving average values and the number of rating changes since we initiated coverage. To the right of the grid you’ll see the company’s address, web site and key executives.

On the page’s third tier we have added two brand new charts (long overdue, we know) that show the company’s revenue and net income per employee alongside the top five companies in the industry and the group’s average. This will provide you with additional context about each company’s operating efficiency and profitability in addition to our wealth of indicators, metrics and analyses available throughout our site. To the right of these two charts you may see the largest and smallest company in the industry as well as the group’s overall rating breakdown.

Finally, at the bottom of the page you will find an enhanced and expanded ‘Industry Ranking’ table that shows the top ten graded companies in the group along with a few other indicators and fundamental metrics such as revenue, net income, free cash flow and price to earnings ratio.

We hope our new ‘Company Profile’ page becomes a good starting point in your research process when evaluating new investment candidates. We’ll discuss our new ‘Stock Ideas’ pages, also launched this morning, in upcoming posts.

Amid an uncertain economic climate investors should be looking not only for companies that are able to survive an economic downturn but also for those that might actually benefit from taking market share from weaker rivals that may be too busy defending their turf or simply focused on surviving a weak economy. A good place to find these companies is MarketGrader’s Cash Kings idea list, one of 22 unique lists published daily for our subscribers.  In order to qualify as a ‘Cash King,’ a company must have an overall ‘Buy’ rating from MarketGrader, a Cash Flow overall grade of at least A- and a minimum of $1 billion in cash on hand. Our current list, available for free to all visitors as the Idea List of the Week, includes a total of 113 companies. 22 of them have at least $10 billion in cash on hand and 36 have a market cap of at least $50 billion; this is clearly a list of mostly large cap companies, with the smallest one, BBVA Banco Frances SA Buenos Aires (BFR), having a capitalization of $1.8 billion. And very telling perhaps of investor preference for safer, solid companies amid the recent market downturn, only five of the companies on the list have a Negative Sentiment rating, while 30 have a Neutral Sentiment rating and 78 have a Positive Sentiment rating.

The following are a few of the highlights of the top ten Cash Kings on MarketGrader.com:

1. Intel Corp (NASD: INTC)

Intel, which was recently the highest overall graded company in all of MarketGrader, has only $2.14 billion in total debt, compared to $11.90 billion in cash on hand. The company received an A+ grade in 4 of the 6 indicators that make up our Cash Flow category: EBITDA Margin, Debt/Cash Flow Ratio, Interest Coverage Capacity and Economic Value. Intel has an overall grade of 91.8 (out of 100).

2. Cliff’s Natural Resources Inc. (NYSE: CLF)

Cliff’s Natural Resources, with an overall grade of 89.0, saw its cash flow grow considerably in its latest quarter to $106.90 million, a 60.27% increase from $66.70 million reported in the year earlier period. The company’s liquidity is not only remarkable but the current amount of debt it carries relative to the cash flow it generates from its operations is even lower now than it was a year ago. It received an A+ grade in 3 of our 6 Cash Flow indicators: Cash Flow Growth, Debt/Cash Flow Ratio and Retention Rate.

3. Apple Inc. (NASD: AAPL)

Apple is truly a cash machine, generating almost $6 billion in free cash flow per quarter and more than $23 billion over the last 12 months.  Its cash flow grew considerably in its latest quarter to $6.22 billion, a 166.91% increase from $2.33 billion reported in the year earlier period. When compared to the 96.25% increase in cash flow in the last twelve months it seems like the rate of growth is accelerating, which could have a very positive impact on earnings growth in coming quarters. The company clearly has very strong liquidity having no debt to finance and $29.23 billion in cash on hand. This affords it significant flexibility to take on debt if it wanted to pursue new growth opportunities such as an acquisition. Apple received an A+ in 5 of 6 Cash Flow indicators: Cash Flow Growth, Debt/cash flow Ratio, Interest Covering Capacity, Economic Value, and Retention Rate. It has an overall grade of 88.0.

The following companies round out our top ten Cash Kings:

4. Research In Motion LTD. (NASD: RIMM)- Overall Grade: 87.6

5. Vale SA (NYSE: VALE)- Overall Grade: 87.2

6. Microsoft (NASD: MSFT)- Overall Grade: 87.1

7. Freeport-Mcmoran Copper and Gold (NYSE: FCX)- Overall Grade: 86.0

8. Altera Corp (NASD: ALTR)- Overall Grade: 86.0

9. Lam Research Corp (NASD: LRCX)- Overall Grade: 84.9

10.  Annaly Capital Management (NYSE: NLY)- Overall Grade: 84.4

For the complete list of all 113 “Cash Kings” and their fundamental analysis, please click here.