This time of the year asset management firms and others usually publish their top stock ideas for the following year. I found the following list from Canada’s RBC Dominion Securities interesting:

Source: RBC’s 30 top stock picks for 2013, The Globe and Mail

The above list does not include stocks from Asia, Latin America, Africa and the Middle East. These stocks have the potential to outperform the market according to RBC’s analysts. On the selection criteria  used, the article noted:

The bank culled the names for its best performers from among the 1,500 companies its analysts cover in Canada, the U.S., the UK and Europe. The analysts were told to offer their “best money-making ideas in absolute terms using a risk-adjusted approach.” The only restriction was that they had to pick larger-sized companies with market capitalization of at least $2-billion and a minimum of $20-million in daily trading value, stocks that would be suitable for a global institutional investor.

I am not yet convinced of investments in U.S. stocks based on the housing market recovery theme. Though most of the homebuilders and related companies have had a nice run this year, the real estate market does not seem to have bottomed out  according to my non-scientific observation.

Disclosure: Long PNC, SWDBY, TD