Making The Grade: Education Stocks Get Government Reprieve (APOL, DV, COCO, STRA, EDMC, LOPE, UTI)

Tickerspy’s Education Index

EDUCATION INVESTING IDEAS

• Popular long ideas: APOL, EDU, COCO
• Popular short ideas: APOL, EDU, ESI
• Top dividend plays: EPAX, LINC, UTI
• Pro favorites: DV, LOPE, EDU

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EDUCATION COVERAGE

These firms are for-profit education providers or have significant exposure to the education sector

• Goldman Goes Back To School On Education Stocks (APOL, DV, EDMC, ESI, STRA)
• Strayer, Rivals Hurt By Bad Press (STRA, DV, CPLA, EDMC, CECO, APOL, COCO, LOPE)
• Education Stocks Still Face Political Headwinds As Investors Hunt For Positives (COCO, ESI, DVOX, REVU, UTI, XUE)

EDUCATION CHART

EDUCATION METRICS

Avg. Market Cap:	$831.2M
Avg. P/E Ratio:	23.0
Avg. Div Yield:	0.5%

Shares of Apollo Group (APOL), the operator of the University of Phoenix for-profit universities, are surging 10% after the Obama administration gave the company and its rivals additional time to comply with new federal stipulations. The Education Stocks Index is soaring 3% on the news.

Under new guidelines released by the Department of Education, companies such as Apollo and DeVry (DV) won’t be at risk for losing federal funding until 2015. Under an earlier proposal, for-profit education providers could have lost federal aid as soon as 2012, Bloomberg News reported. Shares of DeVry are up 11%.

For-profit education companies received $30 billion in federal aid last year, but the companies have come under intense scrutiny at both the federal and state levels for higher-than-average student loan default rates as graduates of these schools often find themselves saddled with large debts and no jobs to repay those loans with.

For-profit colleges, attended by about 3 million students annually, spent at least $6.6 million in 2010 to lobby against the regulations, Bloomberg reported.

Corinthian Colleges (COCO) is easily the best performer in the Index today with a 31% pop. Strayer Education (STRA) is soaring 13% while Education Management (EDMC) is up 24%. Grand Canyon Education (LOPE) and Universal Technical Inst (UTI) are both higher by 6%.

Investors can track the Education Stocks Index for performance trends and a suite of other metrics at tickerspy.com.

Tags: APOL, COCO, DV, EDMC, LOPE, STRA, UTI