Topic: How To Invest

Hi Pat: Your thoughts on two stocks please: Heckmann Corp. and DaVita HealthCare Partners. Many thanks.

Article Excerpt

Heckmann Corp., $3.99, symbol HEK on New York (Shares outstanding: 251.7 million; Market cap: $1.0 billion; www.heckmanncorp.com), disposes of the waste water that results from unconventional oil and gas exploration and production, such as the fracking methods used in shale oil and gas regions. (Fracking involves the high-pressure injection of water, sand and chemicals into rock formations to break them up and make it easier to retrieve oil and gas reserves.) The company has more than 1,200 trucks in service. It also rents out more than 4,200 “frac tanks,” for containing waste water, and 1,900 upright and other types of tanks. Heckmann plans to change its name to Nuverra Environmental Solutions in mid-May. The company’s stock symbol will change to NES from HEK. In March 2012, Heckmann bought used-oil recycling company Thermo Fluids Inc. from Chicago-based private equity firm CIVC Partners for $245 million in cash and stock. The company made this purchase to diversify its operations beyond waste-water disposal. In September 2012,…