Cramer Likes Jefferies (JEF)

Over at theStreet.com, Jim Cramer offered up his bullish thoughts on Jefferies

, which he believes may be a takeout target. Here are his thoughts on the stock, courtesy of theStreet. "As for Jefferies (JEF - commentary - Trade Now), that's an easy one. As I said earlier, the fin-reg changes were real, and they opened up the derivative market to others besides Goldman Sachs (GS - commentary - Trade Now), JPMorgan (JPM - commentary - Trade Now), Morgan Stanley (MS - commentary - Trade Now), Bank of America (BAC - commentary - Trade Now)/Merrill and Citigroup (C - commentary - Trade Now) which had been pretty dominant. The big sleeper player that has emerged is Jefferies, and it is hiring like mad to take advantage of it. I think it is moving up because of that change in the law, as the quarter itself was quite disappointing. This could be a terrific moment for Jefferies, and I suspect that it is just beginning a big run, particularly because, as the Financial Times points out, trading is rebounding this quarter in bonds. In another part of the FT there is speculation that Nomura (NMR - commentary - Trade Now) is eyeing a U.S. acquisition. Again, it would not be odd for Jefferies to be on Nomura's radar screen. With this beachhead in derivatives courtesy of Congress, Jefferies has made itself a totally logical takeover target. It is hard to explain these moves otherwise. They seem nascent and strong and buttressed by the charts, all of which looks fabulous. I would never speculate on a takeover when the fundamentals are declining, but in each case they are improving, and it is worth considering these three financials for the next leg of this bull market run in brokers and banks. At the time of publication, Cramer was long JPM. "