Barron's Latest Picks And Pans: Lowe's, Microsoft, Vertex Pharmaceuticals, ViacomCBS And More

• This weekend's Barron's provides some insight into Cathie Wood, one of Barron's 100 most influential women in the United States this year.
• Other featured articles discuss how Barron's ugly stock picks have fared since last summer, two companies that are reinventing themselves and why good news is bad for tech stocks.
• Also, the prospects for a luxury e-commerce play, a biopharmaceutical stock, a big-box retailer and more.

"ARK's Cathie Wood Disrupted Investment Management. She's Not Done Yet" by Evie Liu discusses why recent setbacks do not scare one of this year's 100 most influential women in the United States. See why Wood favors Tesla Inc TSLA in the ARK Innovation ETF ARKK and other ARK Invest funds.

Nicholas Jasinski's "A Tech Stock With a Tailwind—Luxury E-Commerce" makes the case that MYT Netherlands Parent BV MYTE is a cheap play on Gucci, Burberry and other luxury brands. See why Barron's believes that high-end e-commerce boutique Mytheresa has a big opportunity when it comes to luxury shopping online.

In "Vertex Stock Fell After a Setback on a New Drug. It's an Opportunity for Investors," Josh Nathan-Kazis suggests that Boston-based Vertex Pharmaceuticals Incorporated VRTX has a cystic fibrosis franchise that remains strong despite the recent setback, and the biopharmaceutical company's pipeline looks promising as well.

Home-improvement retailer Lowe's Companies Inc LOW is far more than just a COVID-19 lockdown winner, according to "Lowe's Stock Can Win the Reopening, Too" by Teresa Rivas. Find out why Barron's believes that concerns about homeowners shifting their focus away from their homes as the economy recovers are probably overblown.

In Al Root's "These Stock Picks Were Ugly, Their Returns Not So Much," Barron's revisits stocks it looked at last July that were cheap and had no Buy ratings from Wall Street analysts. Discover how the featured stocks, including Blackbaud, Inc. BLKB and Sally Beauty Holdings, Inc. SBH, have fared since last summer.

"Volkswagen and ViacomCBS Are Reinventing Themselves" by Jack Hough suggests that the recent pivots of German car-making giant Volkswagen toward electric vehicles and newly reunited media conglomerate ViacomCBS Inc. VIAC toward video streaming are good for their stocks.

See also: Benzinga's Weekly Bulls And Bears: Costco, Disney, Roku, Snowflake, Tesla And More

The tech sector typically requires a trade-off for equity income investors: low yields in exchange for growing dividends. So says Lawrence C. Strauss's "Here Are 4 Tech Plays That Offer Solid Yield and Dividend Growth." This article presents some tech stocks, including QUALCOMM, Inc. QCOM, that give investors the best of both.

In "There's Reason for Optimism. That's Bad News for Tech," Eric J. Savitz points out that the tech sell-off has become ugly, and tech names no longer have the exclusive on growth investing. However, Barron's feels that there is still reason to be bullish about the likes of Applied Materials, Inc. AMAT and HP Inc HPQ.

Eric J. Savitz's "Microsoft Stock Has Been Flat for 6 Months. Why It Could Be Time to Jump Aboard" shows why one top analyst claims that two key themes playing out in enterprise computing could give Microsoft Corporation MSFT shares the boost they have needed. How far can the stock run in the next year?

Also in this week's Barron's:

• The latest Barron's annual ranking of the 100 most influential women
• Why Taiwan and Korea hold the keys to U.S. tech supply security
• How Elizabeth Warren's wealth tax could be good for investors
• Whether the Federal Reserve will cap bond yields
• The role of nuclear power in clean energy
• How to use options like Warren Buffett
• What the lack of Wall Streeters in the Biden administration means for investors
• What comes next for inflation
• What China's falling birthrate means for its economy
• Why the red-hot SPAC market could spell trouble
• How a cash stash can help retirees keep peace of mind
• The notable food-and-wine events that face an uncertain year ahead

At the time of this writing, the author had no position in the mentioned equities.

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