Credit: Image source: .So, you've landed on this page looking for the best stocks to buy right now. I won't disappoint you. In the paragraph directly below, you'll find a link that fulfills the promise. Now, if you'd like to learn a method for consistently finding stocks that are both attractive and timely, consider sticking around -- and reading on -- after you've checked out the following recommendations:
A secret billion-dollar stock opportunity
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Finding the best stocks now -- on your own
I can't pretend to teach you in the space of a brief article how to pick stocks like the Gardner brothers, founders of The Motley Fool. But I can show you an effective tool relevant to the two adjectives used to describe investments in the title of this article: "best" and "now."
Image source: .
Image source: Sectorspdr.com .
Perennial market leading sectors like financial services, healthcare, and technology are underperforming thus far in 2016. Investors appear to be looking for both safety and dividend yield as the utilities sector leads all investment areas. Stretching this out to the last trailing 12 months, it's apparent the year-to-date trend is part of a longer pattern:
Image source: .
Image source: Sectorspdr.com .
Finally, we can push out further to a five year view. The results are again interesting:
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Image source: Sectorspdr.com .
Over a longer period of time, healthcare and technology have posted appreciable equity gains, which is what we'd expect given that these two sectors have played an outsized role in U.S. economic growth for many years.
But it may surprise some that at every snapshot we viewed, consumer staples exhibited a positive and meaningful return, even outpacing technology in the last five years. For those who like safe but steady returns, consumer staples is a sector worth a closer look.
And drilling down is easy with the tracker. We can click on the sectors in the charts to get a list of the top-performing S&P stocks in each area. Curious to know which companies are driving the stellar performance of utilities year to date? Here's the list:
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Image source: Sectorspdr.com .
The tracker not only isolates the most successful sectors of the economy as represented by stock return performance, it also helps us hone in on specific, actionable investment ideas.
Of course, these potential investments are limited to S&P 500 constituents. You can use the sector and stock information as a jumping-off point for your research to find additional opportunities in the broader market.
For example, considering top-performing American Water Works (NYSE: AWK) in the list above, we might conduct a search to find smaller-capitalization utilities that also specialize in the demand-rich industry of waste water services.
In sum, the sector tracker discussed in this article should be thought of as a launching point for research into the greater world of sector-based investing. It's an area worth devoting some time to -- one I believe will markedly enhance your ability to find the best stocks to add to your holdings.
Asit Sharma has no position in any stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. Try any of our Foolish newsletter services free for 30 days . We Fools may not all hold the same opinions, but we all believe that considering a diverse range of insights makes us better investors. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy .
The views and opinions expressed herein are the views and opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of Nasdaq, Inc.
The views and opinions expressed herein are the views and opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of Nasdaq, Inc.
