Stocks were flat to slightly higher on Thursday morning, the final trading day of the first quarter. This week's initial jobless claims were 210,000, down from a revised 212,000 last week. Ongoing unemployment was 1,819,000, an increase of 24,000 from the previous week's revised level. The third estimate of Q4 U.S. GDP came in at 3.4%, an increase of 0.2% from the prior estimate. The change reflects upward revisions to consumer spending and nonresidential fixed investment that more than offset a downward revision to private inventories. The S&P 500 rose 0.1%, while the Dow and the Nasdaq were both nearly flat. Crude oil traded above $82 per barrel and gold was up $21 to $2234 per ounce.

Monday Tee Up: A Short but Busy Week

We are one session away from making it 17 out of 19 weeks in which stocks have moved to the upside. We've been throwing grenades at this move for a while, based on overbought and divergent momentum readings and excessive sentiment readings -- and it just does not matter. Yes, price is the final arbiter!

This pick list highlights constituents of the Morningstar US Mid Cap Index that we believe offer investors the best risk-adjusted return prospects. The market capitalization range for U.S. mid-caps typically falls between $1 billion and $8 billion and represents 20% of the total capitalization of the U.S. equity market.