The 24/7 Wall St./Flame Index: Companies With The Worst Press (4/29/2011

Investing

Published: April 29, 2011 11:05 am

A great deal of the most harsh business press is related to Warren Buffett companies and the Sokol insider trading scandal. The puts Berkshire Hathaway and Lubrizol on the list

Allergan received negative coverage as it lost a $212 Botox damage suit.

The Flame Index started as a research tool in 2008 at the NY Innovation Design Lab (nyidlab). It was used as a general metric to evaluate companies and their risk in the media. Publicly traded Fortune 500 companies are used as a measure to calculate an overall market of negative news and the companies are ranked within that market

Rank	Company	Ticker	Score	Change in Rank	Comments
1	Sony Corporation	SNE	41.156	+4	Press still critical about PlayStation Network hack
2	Berkshire Hathaway	BRK.A	39.062	+2	Buffett tries to explain Sokol insider trades
3	Johnson & Johnson	JNJ	29.81	-1	Synthes buyout will cost $21.7 billion and does not fix JNJ OTC drug trouble
4	Toyota Motor Corporation	TM	26.262	-3	Production still shuttered by quake
5	Bank of America Corp.	BAC	25.735	+2	Earnings still rattle investors
6	Community Health Systems	CYH	25.396	-3	Buyout of Tenet unpopular
7	American International Group	AIG	25.343	+5	NY Fed sells $1.1 billion in AIG mortgage related bonds
8	Massey Energy	MEE	25.305	-2	Buyout deal should close soon
9	Rite Aid	RAD	23.949	+1	Tiny improvement in April same-store sales
10	CenturyLink	CTL	23.166	+55	To buy cloud computer company Savvic
10	CenturyLink	CTL	23.166	+55	To buy cloud computer company Savvis for $2.5 billion
12	Constellation Energy	CEG	22.631	+227	Exelon to buy company for $7.9 billion and some investors feel cheated
18	Lubrizol	LZ	20.431	+56	Buffett insider trading scandal
22	Bristol-Myers Squibb	BMY	18.555	+62	Quarterly results underwhelm
24	Allergan	AGN	17.968	+228	Loses $212 million Botox suit

Data and ranking provided by the Flame Index.

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