Flowers Foods (FLO) is a great example of a fairly boring stock that's done incredibly well for investors. Despite having a market value in excess of $2 billion, Flowers is almost completely ignored by Wall Street. The stock is practically invisible on stock message boards but could be a great stock to buy.

With unemployment, a huge deficit and rock bottom interest rates, it's clear that economic trends are pointing to deflation at home and inflation abroad. Something has to give, but unfortunately the government continues to spend freely and run up the federal deficit and the Federal Reserve has refused to raise interest rates.

One of my favorite simple trading strategies for individual investors is to put your retirement money in a growing stock. That sounds pretty straightforward, but many investors quickly realize it's not as simple an investing strategy as it seems – especially when it comes to finding hot penny stocks to buy now. After all, many of the big-name stocks to buy that you hear about every day are massive blue chips that have already seen their biggest growth. And some of the penny stocks that are small up-and-comers are aggressive, risky investments that could cost you everything.

On Thursday, the Hong Kong stock exchange approved the 2010 ipo of the Agricultural Bank of China. The AgBank IPO application is for a $20 billion to $30 billion initial public offering. Hong Kong's approval now makes the Agricultural Bank of China a virtual certainty for this IPO, and AgBank stock could begin trading on both the Hong Kong and Shanghai exchanges by mid-July.

Take Two Interactive (TTWO) shareholders had cause to celebrate yesterday as the game publisher announced that its latest product, video game western Red Dead Redemption, old over 5 million units less than a month after its release. The game, developed by controversial and popular studio Rockstar Games, has been so successful that Take-Two has raised its forecast for fiscal year 2010, expecting a loss of only 10 to 30 cents where previous forecasts were predicting a loss of up to 60 cents a share. Take-Two shares went up more than 2% following the announcement on Tuesday.

WAG shares are down this morning as investors respond to the latest developments in the skirmish between drug store stocks Walgreen Co. (WAG) and CVS Caremark Corp. (CVS).

Another Goldman CDO, called Hudson Mezzanine, is now being looked into, according to the Financial Times.

Healthcare investment is front and center now that reforms have been passed by the U.S. Congress. The healthcare bill puts the issue of health and wellness at the front of American minds as well this year. The truth is, though, even if the bill hadn't passed our aging demographics and rising obesity rates would have made health care a growth industry.

There have been a lot of investors perking up to Starbucks (SBUX) lately – and with good reason. The Seattle-based coffee shop has posted +12% profits since January 1 in a down year so far for the rest of Wall Street. In the long term things look even better for Starbucks stock, with shares up more than +70% over the last 12 months – trouncing the +15% gains in the major indexes!

The bull market isn't gone, it's just been taking a bit of a coffee break. One of the best stocks to buy in the last year has been Starbucks (SBUX), a coffee icon around the world and savior to caffiene junkies everywhere. SBUX stock is up 12% year-to-date as of today's closing bell and has significantly outperformed other restaurant and foodservice stocks in recent months. What's more, in the last year shares are up over +70% -- blowing away the +15% tallied by the Dow. SBUX stock is still going strong and there are plenty of reasons to buy.

Peru has surprisingly become one of the jewels of South America, stabilizing after years of armed conflict, corruption, economic ruin and disarray. And at the center of the miracle is the financial services giant Credicorp (BAP), which has helped to finance gold and copper miners and guided the government back to stability. Businesses expanding their factories, students needing college loans and homeowners needing to finance cars and homes all turn to BAP, which does a third of the entire country's banking business. Shares have started the month with a 3% gain.

Whole Foods (WFMI) is in a class of its own, despite the fact that retail sales at grocery store stocks have not been inspiring in the last year or so as the recession weighed on consumer spending. Companies like Supervalu (SVU), Kroger (KR) and others slashed prices and squeezed margins to court shoppers – and even Walmart (WMT) had to institute a massive "rollback" to prove it was really the best bargain out there. Walmart slashed prices on over 10,000 items covering mostly food and general merchandise.

BRIC investments and Brazil funds have huge potential right now, and Brazil is my favorite natural resource market. Unlike BRIC market Russia, It has no Putin effect and a very conservative central bank, which in today's world of printing money is beginning to sound like an oxymoron. The key to investing in Brazil is understanding that the headline index is dominated by a couple of big companies -- Petrobras (NYSE: PBR) and Vale (NYSE: VALE).

Investors know that investing in the stock market has plenty of ups and downs, and that no investment strategy will insulate you from the unexpected. The stock market can be a fickle place, where what's in one month is out the next. Investors have learned to take a short-term approach to things in the wake of the financial crisis, prepared to get defensive quickly if the market has one of its "retest" fits where it doesn't seem like any investment is going to see appreciation for a while.

Penny stocks offer big profit potential for your investment money. Though normally I don't recommend many financial stocks because banks lack the sales and earnings I demand, there are many penny stocks to buy now in the financial sector that have big growth potential for investors.