5 Best Cheapest Stocks To Invest In Right Now

The S&P 500 (SNPINDEX: ^GSPC  ) has never been higher; in fact, if you had invested in March 2009 -- the Great Recession's market bottom -- you'd be looking at a 150% return in just over four years. That might make you think stocks are too expensive, but if you look at a few individual companies in the S&P 500, that's not necessarily the case.

One way to measure whether a stock is "cheap" is by its price tag. That's not the best measure, though; it's highly influenced by how many shares a company has outstanding. A different metric to use is a company's price-to-earnings ratio. This tells you how much a stock is worth, relative to how much money its company made over the past year. Right now, the average S&P 500 stock trades for a P/E of 19.3.�

But even when we find companies with low P/E ratios, it doesn't necessarily mean they're a good investment -- these stocks could be trading cheaply for a reason. To dig deeper, let's investigate the five cheapest stocks in the S&P 500.

Hot Financial Stocks To Invest In 2015: Credit Suisse Group AG (CSGN)

Credit Suisse Group AG is a Switzerland-based holding company engaged in private banking, investment banking and asset management areas. It operates through four divisions: Private Banking, which consists of the Wealth Management Clients and Corporate & Institutional Clients business; Investment Banking, provides a range of financial products and services, with a focus on client-driven, flow-based and capital-efficient businesses; Asset Management, offers a range of asset class products, including alternative investments, and multi-asset class solutions, including equities and fixed income products, and Shared Services, which provides centralized corporate services and business support for the Company's divisions. Advisors' Opinion:

• [By Sharon Cho]

  Growing demand for the most-stable equities has spurred a record 31 straight days of foreign inflows into South Korean shares, while concern over Federal Reserve tapering and America�� debt-ceiling debate sent the benchmark gauge of U.S. stock volatility to a three-month high on Oct. 8. Credit Suisse Group AG (CSGN), UBS Wealth Management and Bank Julius Baer & Co. say they��e bullish on South Korea as smaller price swings lure investors to companies from SK Hynix Inc. (000660) to LG Chem Ltd. (051910)

• [By Inyoung Hwang]

  Credit Suisse (CSGN)�� Chen took a new look at publicly listed private-equity firms, including Apollo Global Management LLC, Blackstone Group LP (BX) and Carlyle Group LP. (CG) Investors are still struggling to properly value them, he says.

5 Best Cheapest Stocks To Invest In Right Now: Alkermes Inc.(ALKS)

Alkermes plc, an integrated biotechnology company, develops medicines that enhance patient outcomes. The company has a diversified portfolio of approximately 20 commercial drug products and a clinical pipeline of product candidates that address central nervous system (CNS) disorders, such as addiction, schizophrenia, and depression. It manufactures and commercializes VIVITROL for alcohol and opioid dependence; RISPERDAL CONSTA for schizophrenia and bipolar I disorder; INVEGA SUSTENNA for the treatment of schizophrenia; AMPYRA to improve walking in patients with multiple sclerosis; and BYDUREON for the treatment of type II diabetes. Alkermes? pipeline includes extended-release injectable and oral products for the treatment of prevalent, chronic diseases, such as central nervous system disorders, addiction, and diabetes. The company was founded in 1987 and headquartered in Dublin, Ireland.

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By Sean Williams]

  Alkermes (NASDAQ: ALKS  ) also joined the party by announcing on Thursday that its experimental major depressive disorder therapy ALKS-5461 had received a fast track designation from the Food and Drug Administration. A fast track designation helps a biotechnology company by expediting its review process once it files for a new drug application so this is great news for Alkermes shareholders and MDD patients. In mid-stage trials ALKS-5461 met its primary endpoint of a change from the baseline in depressive symptoms according to the Hamilton Depression Rating Scale when tested in a group of 142 patients. ALKS-5461 holds unique promise since most MDD drugs are really a one-size-fits-all type medication.

• [By Sean Williams]

  It's not easy to reinvent yourself in the biotechnology sector, but that's exactly the path that Alkermes (NASDAQ: ALKS  ) CEO Richard Pops has decided to take his company.

5 Best Cheapest Stocks To Invest In Right Now: ANSYS Inc (ANSS)

ANSYS, Inc. (ANSYS) develops and globally markets engineering simulation software and services used by engineers, designers, researchers and students across a range of industries and academia, including aerospace, automotive, manufacturing, electronics, biomedical, energy and defense. The Company distributes its ANSYS suite of simulation technologies through a global network of independent resellers and distributors (collectively, channel partners) and direct sales offices in global locations. The Company�� product portfolio consists of ANSYS Workbench, multiphysics product, structural mechanics, fluid dynamics, explicit dynamics, electromagnetic, system simulation, simulation process and data management, academic, high-performance computing (HPC), geometry interfaces, meshing and Apache design low-power electronic solutions. On August 1, 2011, the Company acquired Apache Design, Inc.

ANSYS Workbench

ANSYS Workbench is the framework upon which the Company�� suite of advanced engineering simulation technologies is built. The ANSYS Workbench platform delivers productivity, enabling Simulation Driven Product Development.

Multiphysics

The Company�� multiphysics product suite allows engineers and designers to create virtual prototypes of their designs operating under multiphysics conditions. ANSYS multiphysics software enables engineers and scientists to simulate the interactions between structural mechanics, heat transfer, fluid flow and electromagnetics all within a single, engineering simulation environment.

Structural Mechanics

The Company�� structural mechanics product suite offers simulation tools for product design. These tools have capabilities that cover a range of analysis types, elements, contacts, materials, equation solvers and coupled physics capabilities all focused towards understanding and solving complex design problems.

Fluid Dynamics

The Company�� fluid dynamics product suit! e offers modeling of fluid flow and other related physical phenomena. Fluid flow analysis capabilities provide all the tools needed to design new fluids equipment and to troubleshoot already existing installations. The fluid dynamics product suite contains general-purpose computational fluid dynamics software and specialized products to address specific industry applications.

Explicit Dynamics

The Company�� explicit dynamics product suite simulates events involving short-duration, large-strain, large-deformation, fracture, complete material failure or structural problems with complex interactions. This product suite is used for simulating physical events that occur in a short period of time and may result in material damage or failure.

Electromagnetics

The Company�� electromagnetics product suite provides field simulation software for designing high-performance electronic and electromechanical products. The software streamlines the design process and predicts performance - all prior to building a prototype - of mobile communication and Internet-access devices, broadband networking components and systems, integrated circuits (IC) and printed circuit boards (PCB), as well as electromechanical systems such as automotive components and power electronics equipment.

System Simulation

The Company delivers the ability to perform complete simulation studies as a system for some of the product designs. This is accomplished through a complete set of physics solutions that are integrated into a multiphysics capabilities set. A collaborative simulation environment provides modeling scalability for evaluating entire systems, including three dimensional (3-D) high-fidelity models, multibody dynamics, circuit reduced-order models, and any combination of these.

Simulation Process and Data Management

ANSYS Engineering Knowledge Manager (ANSYS EKM) is a solution for simulation-based process and data management. ANSY! S EKM pro! vides solutions to all levels of a company, enabling an organization to address the issues associated with simulation data, including backup and archival, traceability and audit trail, process automation and intellectual property protection.

Academic

The Company�� academic product suite provides a portfolio of academic products based on several usage tiers: associate, research and teaching. Each tier includes various noncommercial products that bundle a range of physics and advanced coupled field solver capabilities. The academic product suite provides entry-level tools intended for class demonstrations and hands-on instruction. It provides flexible terms of use and more complex analysis suitable for doctoral and post-doctoral research projects. The Company also provides a product suitable for student use at home.

High-Performance Computing

The Company�� HPC product suite enables insight into product performance. The HPC product suite delivers cross-physics parallel processing capabilities for the full spectrum of the Company�� simulation software by supporting structural, fluids, thermal and electromagnetic simulations in a single HPC solution.

Geometry Interfaces

The Company offers geometry handling solutions for engineering simulation in an integrated environment with direct interfaces to all CAD systems, support of additional readers and translators. It also offers an integrated geometry modeler focused on analysis.

Meshing

Creating a mesh that transforms a physical model into a mathematical model is a critical and foundational step in almost every engineering simulation study. The Company�� meshing technology provides a means to balance these requirements, obtaining the right mesh for each simulation in the most automated way possible.

Apache Design Low-Power Electronic Solutions

The Company�� suite of Apache software delivers power analysis and optimization pl! atforms a! long with integrated methodologies that provide capabilities for managing the power budget, power delivery integrity, and power-induced noise in an electronic design, from initial prototyping to system sign-off. These solutions deliver correlation to silicon measurement, and the capacity to handle an entire electronic system, including IC, package, and PCB.

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By Jonas Elmerraji]

  We're seeing the exact same setup in shares of simulation software maker ANSYS (ANSS). Like CSC, ANSYS is sandwiched between a horizontal price ceiling above shares around $90 a share and a similar horizontal floor at $83.50 a share. From here, the trading signal comes on a breakout outside of the channel.

  Whenever you're looking at any technical price pattern, it's critical to think in terms of those buyers and sellers. Rectangles, triangles, and other pattern names are a good quick way to explain what's going on in a stock, but they're not the reason it's tradable – instead, it all comes down to supply and demand for shares.

  That $90 resistance level is a price where there has been an excess of supply of shares; in other words, it's a place where sellers have been more eager to step in and take gains than buyers have been to buy. That's what makes a breakout above it so significant – the move means buyers are finally strong enough to absorb all of the excess supply above that price level. Don't be early on this trade.

• [By GURUFOCUS]

  ANSYS, Inc. (ANSS), the market leader in simulation-driven product development software, declined after reporting quarterly results that were negatively impacted by slower end market demand. Despite the near-term headwind, we believe that ANSYS remains the dominant global provider of simulation software and that the company stands to benefit from the ongoing adoption of its simulation tools. We also believe that ANSYS will increasingly use its cash to repurchase its shares, which we believe will generate additional shareholder value.

5 Best Cheapest Stocks To Invest In Right Now: Nuveen Equity Premium Opportunity Fund (JSN)

Nuveen Equity Premium Opportunity Fund (the Fund) is a diversified, closed-end management investment company. The Fund primarily invests in a diversified equity portfolio that seeks to substantially replicate price movements of either the Standard & Poor's 500 Stock Index or a weighted average of the Standard & Poor's 500 Stock Index and the NASDAQ-100 Index and is designed to support the Funds' index option strategies. Nuveen Asset Management is the adviser of the Fund. The Adviser has engaged Gateway Investment Advisers, L.P. (Gateway/Sub-Adviser) as Sub-Adviser to provide discretionary investment advisory services.

The initial target weighting of the Fund's equity portfolio in seeking to replicate the weighted average price movements of the market indexes will be 75% of the Standard & Poor's 500 Stock Index and 25% of the NASDAQ-100 Index. Over time, these percentage weightings may vary as the result of relative changes in each index. The Fund intends to pursue its investment objectives by utilizing an index option strategy of selling index call options and buying index put options, each on the Standard & Poor's 500 Stock Index and the NASDAQ-100 Index.

The Fund's comparative benchmark performance is a blended return consisting of 75% of the return of the S&P 500 Index, and 25% of the return of the NASDAQ-100 Index, which includes 100 of the largest domestic and international non-financial companies listed on The NASDAQ Stock Market based on market capitalization. The NASDAQ-100 Index reflects companies across major industry groups, including computer hardware and software, telecommunications, retail/wholesale trade and biotechnology.

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By Robert Hsu]

  Here are four to consider:

  PowerShares S&P 500 BuyWrite ETF (PBP), yielding 4.09%
  
  Madison/Claymore Covered Call & Equity Strategy (MCN), yielding 8.94%
  
  Nuveen Equity Premium Opportunity Fund (JSN), yielding 9.19%
  
  BlackRock Enhanced Dividend Achievers (BDJ), yielding 7.39%
  
  

  The yield on these funds is very attractive. Even more attractive is the fact that many buy-write funds actually are selling at a discount to their net asset value.

• [By Robert Hsu]
  Name Type of Security� Recommendation� Kinder Morgan Energy Partners L.P. (NYSE: KMP) � MLP August 15, 2013� TeeKay LNG Partners L.P.� (NYSE: TGP) � MLP September 16, 2013� PowerShares S&P 500 BuyWrite Portfol ETF� (NYSE Arca: PBP)� Buy-Write ETF September 30, 2013� Madison Covered Call Equity Strtgy Fd (NYSE: MCN)� Buy-Write ETF September 30, 2013� Nuveen Equity Premium Opportunity Fund (NYSE: JSN)� Buy-Write ETF September 30, 2013� BlackRockEnhanced Dividend Achievers Tr (NYSE: BDJ)� Buy-Write ETF September 30, 2013� Vornado Realty Trust � (NYSE: VNO)� Real Estate
  Investment
  Trust September 26, 2013�
  
  

  Robert Hsu is the editor of Permanent Wealth Investor and a former hedge fund portfolio manager at Wall Street powerhouse Goldman Sachs. He retired from Goldman at age 31. He since has come out of retirement to establish and preside over his money management firm, Absolute Return Capital Advisors. His retirement experience has given him his current mission: helping investors like you achieve their goal of comfortable retirement through profitable income strategies.