Zacks Recent Price Strength Strategy highlights: American Financial Group, Anixter International, ICO Inc. and Littelfuse.

CHICAGO -- This stock picking strategy looks for companies trading in the upper range of their 52-week highs that have attractive fundamental attributes. This strategy proves that "trend is your friend" with a +13.9% return versus +2.1% for the S&P 500 in the first five months of 2006. This screen is called the Recent Price Strength Profit Track strategy. Four stocks meeting this screen's exclusive criteria are American Financial Group, Inc. (NYSE: AFG), Anixter International Inc. (NYSE: AXE), ICO Inc. (Nasdaq: ICOC) and Littelfuse, Inc. (Nasdaq: LFUS). View the entire list of stocks for the Recent Price Strength Profit Track at http://at.zacks.com/?id=1863

Here are details about four companies currently identified by the Recent Price Strength Profit Track:

American Financial Group, Inc. (NYSE: AFG) is currently trading very close to its 52-week high. In early August, the company posted second-quarter earnings that outperformed the year-prior. The result also exceeded the consensus estimate by approximately 8%. American Financial Group has topped analysts' forecasts for the past four straight quarters. The company experienced nearly 5% growth in its share price over the past four weeks.

Anixter International Inc. (NYSE: AXE) is a Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) company that is trading very close to its 52-week high. The company reported second-quarter earnings of $1.15 per share in late July. The result eclipsed the consensus estimate by about 40% and surpassed the previous year's 61 cents. AXE stated that growth was particularly strong in the electrical and electronic wire & cable market due to strong end-market customer demand, global expansion of the markets served and higher copper prices.

ICO Inc. (Nasdaq: ICOC), global producer of custom polymer powders and plastic film concentrates, released its fiscal third-quarter report in early August. Earnings per share of 14 cents improved on last year's break-even result and jumped ahead of the consensus estimate by 40%. ICOC is currently trading near its 52-week high and has advanced in price by about 40% over the past four weeks.

Littelfuse, Inc. (Nasdaq: LFUS) released its second-quarter financial results in early August. The company noted that it set new records for sales and cash flow. Littelfuse's third-quarter earnings per share guidance, of 45 cents to 50 cents, is in line with Wall Street estimates. Analysts are currently projecting 46 cents for the third quarter. The company missed the consensus estimate only once out of the past five consecutive quarters. LFSUS meets the criteria of this Profit Track with a share price that has experienced nearly 8% growth over the past four weeks and is currently very close to its 52-week high.

Discover all the current stocks currently on the Recent Price Strength Profit Track at: http://at.zacks.com/?id=1864

About Profit Tracks

What is a "Profit Track"? Each Profit Track is a successful stock picking strategy with proven results through the Bear Market of 2001-2002 and the Bull run started in 2003. On Zacks.com we have created these nine unique screens to offer investors great strategies to potentially outperform the market in the years ahead. For the first five months of 2006, the Low Price Stocks strategy was the top performing Profit Track with a return of +22.2% followed by the Discounted Fundamental screen with a +18.6% return. To see all nine strategies along with philosophy, past performance and current stocks, go to http://at.zacks.com/?id=1838

All the Profit Track strategies were created and backtested using the Research Wizard software from Zacks Investment Research. If you like this screening strategy, but want to narrow down the list of stocks and even improve the performance, then you should start a free trial to this powerful stock picking tool. Learn more about the Research Wizard free trial offer and our new special report "Top 10 Stock Screening Strategies" at http://at.zacks.com/?id=2156

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