Barron's Recap (5/26/12): The Top 50 Annuities, and Tech Firms Hoard Cash

This weekend in

online: the top 50 annuities, Intel finally goes mobile, what tech companies should do with all that cash, and the prospects for Snap-on.

"

" by Karen Hube. A year ago, guaranteed payouts and benefits on all kinds of annuities were far more generous. But low bond yields and a sagging stock market have forced big insurers to re-evaluate their annuities strategies. Some major providers, such as Hartford Financial

, ING

and Genworth Financial

, have exited the business or significantly scaled back. But there are still some competitive products out there that provide significant assurances for a reasonable price. Out of hundreds of annuities,

narrowed the list to 50 best-in-class investments in five annuity categories: deferred variable, fixed index, fixed deferred, immediate, and longevity insurance.

"Why Intel Deserves Another Look" by Mark Veverka suggests that investors in the Santa Clara, Calif.-based chip maker should be pleased to see its new line of low-power chips showing up in more smartphones in China, France, India, the UK, and the U.S. Intel

, the world's largest producer of computer chips, had missed a lot of the opportunity in the smartphone arena. This new Atom line of chips could change all that, allowing Intel to finally benefit from the ongoing surge in mobile Internet use.

Andrew Bary's "Show Us the Money" points out that many technology firms, such as Dell

, Nvidia

and SanDisk

, are sitting on huge piles of cash. Better dividends would do more for their stocks than hoarding that cash or using it to fund share buybacks, argues the article. The technology sector has a 1.6% yield, the lowest among the 10 sectors of the S&P 500. Apple

, Cisco

, Microsoft

, Qualcomm

and the like should use more cash to pay higher dividends urges

, not for the first time.

In "All Fixed Up and Ready to Go," Neil A. Martin wonders whether Snap-on

stock can ratchet any higher, even as it has rebounded from the recession and is on a solid growth track. "Our business is not recession-proof," CEO Nicholas Pinchuk told

, "but it is recession-resistant." The stock is up more than 100% since 2010. Some analysts and portfolio managers believe there is room for Snap-on to go as much as 20% higher. Latin America's leading online retailer has had a great run, says Bill Alpert in "With Amazon in Hot Pursuit…" But how will MercadoLibre

hold up now that Amazon.com

is set to enter Latin America in earnest , as recent hiring suggests?

bottom line: MercadoLibre's shares could get hit if Amazon does ramp up operations in the region. The article also points out that MercadoLibre's founder recently sold shares.

"In Facebook's Fiasco, Hope for Reform" by Andrew Bary posits that the debacle involving the pricing of the Facebook's

initial public offering could end up changing the way new equity issues are sold. IPOs too often stack the deck in favor of big institutional customers of the underwriters, says the article. But the fuss over Facebook's heavily hyped offering has shown the need for more fairness and transparency in the process.

Other featured stories:

This weekend's

online exclusives include: "Heinz Can Escape Tight Squeeze" by Johanna Bennett suggests that there could be life in HJ Heinz

despite its disappointing week. Two analysts downgraded the stock after the Pittsburgh-based company pared its long-term per-share earnings growth rates.

Also:

Columns in this weekend's

discuss: