BALTIMORE (Stockpickr) -- A potential end to the financial drama in Greece was welcome news for investors over the weekend, as U.S. stocks look to end February on a high note this week. The big S&P 500 index has rallied more than 4.4% so far this month, more than making up for the correction that January kicked off with. So far, this month has been the second-best February for the S&P in the last decade; only last year's 5.4% month-do-date rally was bigger. And while earnings and congressional testimony from Fed boss Janet Yellen will definitely play a big part in this week's price action, you shouldn't discount the upside effects of new highs. Just think about this for a second: Everyone who has ever bought "stocks" as an asset class is sitting on gains right now. That provides a powerful psychological push for equities as we barrel towards March. To make the most of it, we're turning to a fresh set of Rocket Stocks worth buying this week. For the uninitiated, "Rocket Stocks" are our list of companies with short-term gain catalysts and longer-term growth potential. To find them, I run a weekly quantitative screen that seeks out stocks with a combination of analyst upgrades and positive earnings surprises to identify rising analyst expectations, a bullish signal for stocks in any market. After all, where analysts' expectations are increasing, institutional cash often follows. In the last 288 weeks, our weekly list of five plays has outperformed the S&P 500's record run by 79.29%. Without further ado, here's a look at this week's Rocket Stocks. Must Read: Warren Buffett's Top 10 Dividend Stocks Salesforce.com Up first on our list of Rocket Stocks is Salesforce.com , a $40 billion enterprise software maker that's been showing investors some stellar price action in 2015. While the S&P has returned a meager 2.5% since the calendar flipped to January, Salesforce has rallied 7.5% over that same stretch. And this stock's outperformance isn't showing many signs of slowing down here. Salesforce builds software that enables more than 100,000 customers to run business applications that interact with their customer lists, doing everything from sending newsletters to tracking sales. Salesforce provides a vital service, and the mission-critical nature of the firm's offering digs a big economic moat. Because CRM's software packages tend to be deeply integrated in customers' other systems, switching costs are extremely high. Historically, profitability has been something of a sticking point for CRM. Management has opted to spend at high levels to stoke growth, arguing that it will mean bigger profits for investors over the longer-term. Typically, that means that Salesforce suffers more than peers when times get tough -- low profits and flights to quality don't mix well. That said, management's willingness to forego near-term profit for long-term growth is probably the right move in this environment. The fact that shares are gaining traction in early 2015 means that buyers are in control here. Must Read: 10 Stocks Billionaire John Paulson Loves Adobe Systems Adobe Systems is another $40 billion software stock that's making our list of Rocket Stocks this week. Adobe's flagship content creation applications include Photoshop, Acrobat, Dreamweaver and After Effects, which are used by creative professionals the world over to create images, videos, page layouts and Web sites. By establishing itself as the platform of choice for creative professionals, Adobe has been able to capture a lucrative and sticky customer base. Adobe's big-ticket software may be popular, but its big price tags have made piracy an equally big concern for the firm. Adobe has found an elegant solution to that problem by introducing the Creative Cloud, a subscription model that provides the latest version of its software to users at a low monthly cost. That lower barrier to entry should convert more users to paying subscribers; instead of paying thousands of dollars for a license to Adobe's Creative Suite, Creative Cloud access can cost as little at $50 a month. A subscription model also helps to smooth revenues at Adobe, spreading sales across the business cycle and not just when a big new upgrade hits store shelves. So far, customer buy-in has been excellent, and the firm is actually ahead of schedule in its transition plan. Earnings in the middle of next month will give us our next glimpse at Adobe's progress. Must Read: 5 Stocks Warren Buffett Is Selling McGraw Hill Financial $29 billion financial data company McGraw Hill Financial has been enjoying some serious buying pressure in 2015. Since the start of the year, this stock has left the rest of the market in its dust, rallying more than 17.5%. While MHFI may be a relative newcomer to the markets as a standalone stock, it owns some of the most well established financial services and ratings brands in the business, ranging from Standard & Poors to J.D. Power and Associates. McGraw Hill broke apart its education division in early 2013, narrowing its focus on financial services, market research, and ratings. Those are all businesses where brands matter, and the firm's positioning gives it a deep economic moat. Cross-selling opportunities abound with MHFI. Because it's able to use index data from S&P Dow Jones Indices to feed institutional data subscriptions at S&P Capital IQ, for instance, it has some built-in economies of scale. Likewise, S&P's ratings arm is a booming business in this environment, and it's one of the big three nationally recognized statistical ratings organizations. Because MHFI's financial sector exposure deals in data rather than client dollars, its balance sheet is straightforward. The firm carries more than $2.5 billion in cash, offset by a $799 million debt load. While that net cash position is relatively small in terms of total market capitalization, it does help offset the risk of buying this stock. With rising analyst sentiment piling into McGraw Hill this week, we're betting on shares. Must Read: 10 New Stocks Billionaire David Einhorn Loves Nvidia While we're on the subject of cash, it makes sense to take a closer look at Nvidia . Nvidia has more than $3.2 billion in net cash on its books, enough to cover more than 26% of the firm's total market value today. That's a huge risk offset for investors -- it slashes NVDA's ex-cash P/E ratio to a much leaner 15. Nvidia makes graphics chips for computers, portable devices, and gaming systems. As the graphics experience becomes increasingly important to non-traditional machines like cars and phones, NVDA is well-positioned to take advantage of its expertise. Likewise, the firm has been one of the few computer component makers that's been able to hold onto net profit margins that consistently come in the mid-teens. To be sure, NVDA faces some challenges in its core PC graphics market -- the increasing use of integrated graphics is reducing demand for standalone chips -- but it has been good at adapting. Most recently, NVIDIA has been investing heavily in supercomputing, servers, and mobile graphics. Those niche graphics products enable the firm to leverage its existing expertise in an under saturated market. While investors shouldn't put too much emphasis on NVDA's consumer gaming offerings at this point, the firm's automotive technology has potential to scale up as screens move from luxury brands to more mainstream car companies. Must Read: 10 Stocks Carl Icahn Is Buying Columbia Sportswear Last up on our list is outdoor apparel company Columbia Sportswear . This mid-cap clothing and footwear stock has been on a tear lately, rallying more than 35% in the trailing 12 months Much of that fueled just in February by stellar fourth quarter earnings. So what's fueling COLM's upside in the months ahead? Columbia Sportswear owns a handful of popular active brands, including namesake Columbia as well as Sorel, Mountain Hardwear, prAna and Montrail. While the firm's core market comes with serious competition, Columbia owes a lot of its success to its market positioning -- the bulk of the firm's revenues are made selling at value prices without diluting the brand image. That's a tough tightrope to walk, but it's one that COLM has done successfully for years now. An increased emphasis on higher-margin products, like trail footwear and outerwear, has helped to keep profits within grabbing distance of double-digits. Columbia's fourth quarter was a standout. The firm grew net sales 27% to a record high, which is a considerable accomplishment. A particularly brutal winter in COLM's key North American market should translate into a material sales boost this year, and while investors are already pricing it in, momentum is clearly on the side of buyers right now. Rising analyst expectations this week should help spur institutional buying in this under-owned name. -- Written by Jonas Elmerraji in Baltimore. Must Read: Warren Buffett's Top 10 Stock Buys Follow Stockpickr on Twitter and become a fan on Facebook.
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