Boost Your Portfolio Returns With These 4 Top-Performing Liquid Stocks

Investors looking for solid gains should benefit from adding stocks with sound liquidity, which encourages business growth. Liquidity measures a company’s capability to meet short-term debt obligations. Stocks with high liquidity levels have always been in demand, owing to their potential to provide maximum returns.

Investors may want to consider adding four top-ranked stocks — Ciena Corporation (CIEN), EverQuote, Inc. (EVER), Pan American Silver Corp. (PAAS) and GigaCloud Technology Inc. (GCT) — to their portfolios to boost returns.

However, it is important to exercise caution. While high liquidity can indicate that a company is efficiently managing its short-term obligations, it may also suggest underutilization of resources. In some cases, companies with excess liquidity may not be deploying their assets effectively, which could limit growth potential.

Hence, one may consider a company’s efficiency level in addition to its liquidity while identifying prospective winners. A balanced assessment of both liquidity and efficiency can help identify truly promising investment opportunities.

Measures to Identify Liquid Stocks

Current Ratio: It measures current assets relative to current liabilities. The ratio gauges a company’s potential to meet short- and long-term debt obligations. A current ratio — the working capital ratio — below 1 indicates that the company has more liabilities than assets. A high current ratio does not always suggest that the company is in good financial shape. It may also indicate that the firm failed to utilize its assets significantly. Hence, a range of 1-3 is considered ideal.

Quick Ratio: Unlike the current ratio, the quick ratio — the “acid-test ratio” or “quick assets ratio” — indicates a company’s ability to pay short-term obligations. It considers inventory, excluding current assets, relative to current liabilities. A quick ratio of more than 1 is desirable, like the current ratio.

Cash Ratio: This is the most conservative ratio among the three, considering cash and cash equivalents and invested funds relative to current liabilities. It measures a company’s ability to meet existing debt obligations using the most liquid assets. Though a cash ratio of more than 1 may suggest sound financials, a higher number may indicate inefficiency in cash utilization.

A ratio greater than 1 is always desirable, but it may not always represent a company’s financial condition.

Screening Parameters

To pick the best of the lot, we have added asset utilization — a widely used measure of a company’s efficiency — as one of the screening criteria. Asset utilization is the ratio of total sales in the past 12 months to the last four-quarter average of total assets. Though this ratio varies across industries, companies with a ratio higher than that of their industry can be considered efficient.

We added our proprietary Growth Score to the screen to ensure these liquid and efficient stocks have solid growth potential.

Current Ratio, Quick Ratio, and Cash Ratio between 1 and 3: While liquidity ratios greater than 1 are desirable, significantly high ratios may indicate inefficiency.

Asset utilization is more significant than the industry average: A higher asset utilization than the industry average indicates a company’s efficiency.

Zacks Rank equal to #1 (Strong Buy): Only Strong Buy-rated stocks can get through. You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank stocks here.

Growth Score less than or equal to B: Back-tested results show that stocks with a Growth Score of A or B handily beat other stocks when combined with a Zacks Rank #1 or 2 (Buy).

These criteria have narrowed the universe of more than 7,700 stocks to only 11.

Here are four of the 11 stocks that qualified the screen:

EverQuote, headquartered in Cambridge, MA, is an online insurance marketplace. The company's websites allow consumers to shop for auto, home, renters and life insurance.

EverQuote is benefiting from its exclusive data assets and technology, a deepened focus on the core property and casualty (P&C) insurance vertical and a robust financial profile. It is also focused on streamlining traffic operations, boosting AI-powered bidding solutions and rolling out advanced agent technology platforms, which position it well for long-term growth. Recovery in automotive and other insurance verticals bodes well.

In the last reported quarter, total revenues of $173.9 million beat the Zacks Consensus Estimate by 4.6% and grew 20% year over year. Revenues in the Automotive insurance vertical jumped 21% year over year to $157.6 million. Revenues in the Home and Renters insurance vertical totaled $16.3 million, up 15% year over year. For the fourth quarter, revenues are projected to be $174-$180 million, indicating 20% year-over-year growth at the mid-point.

The Zacks Consensus Estimate for EVER’s 2025 earnings is pegged at $1.46 per share, unchanged in the past seven days. The company has a Growth Score of A and a trailing four-quarter earnings surprise of 37.16%, on average.

Ciena is a leading provider of optical networking equipment, software and services. Its fiscal fourth-quarter 2025 results reflected a 20% year-over-year top-line rise, 69.5% EPS growth and a record $5-million order backlog, driven by accelerating AI-led demand from cloud and service provider customers.

Driven by strong cloud and service provider momentum, Ciena expects further gains in 2026. Networking Platforms revenues rose 22% to $1.05 billion, driven by 19% Optical growth on a 72% RLS surge and 49% growth in Routing and Switching, driven by DCOM demand.

Ciena lifted its fiscal 2026 revenue outlook to $5.7-$6.1 billion, suggesting nearly 24% growth at the midpoint, up from the prior 17%, on strong demand from cloud, DCI and AI infrastructure. However, it faces near-term NPI and input cost pressure but expects margin improvement in late fiscal 2026 through supply rebalancing, cost cuts and pricing actions.

The Zacks Consensus Estimate for CIEN’s fiscal 2026 earnings is pegged at $5.33 per share, unchanged in the past seven days. The company has a Growth Score of A and a trailing four-quarter earnings surprise of 22.98%, on average.

Pan American Silver Corp is a Canadian mining company, primarily producing silver and gold in the Americas. It has a vast operating mines’ footprint spanning Canada, Mexico, Brazil, Bolivia, Peru, Chile and Argentina.

The acquisition of MAG Silver Corp. will expand the company’s operations and boost its silver reserve base. The buyout has given Pan American Silver a 44% joint venture interest in the Juanicipio silver mine in Mexico and a total ownership of the Larder exploration project and earn-in interest in the Deer Trail exploration project.

Following the completion of the acquisition in September 2025 and a strong one-month contribution, PAAS raised its 2025 silver production guidance to 22-25 million ounces.

The Zacks Consensus Estimate for PAAS 2025 earnings is pegged at $2.21 per share. The company has a Growth Score of B and a trailing four-quarter earnings surprise of 31.63%, on average.

GigaCloud Technology provides end-to-end B2B e-commerce solutions for large-parcel merchandise worldwide. The company's B2B marketplace brings together suppliers and resellers (in Europe, Asia and North America) to facilitate cross-border transactions.

The company recently acquired New Classic Home Furnishings, Inc. It is a U.S.-based distributor with a portfolio comprising more than 2,000 SKUs and a 1,000-strong customer base of retailers.

GigaCloud expects fourth-quarter 2025 revenues to be between $328 million and $344 million. It delivered third-quarter revenues of $333 million, up 10% year over year. Growth was buoyed by the strength of its marketplace. GMV for the trailing 12 months ended Sept. 30, 2025, surged 21% to nearly $1.5 billion. Europe remains the standout growth engine with 70% revenue growth, helping offset U.S. macro softness.

The Zacks Consensus Estimate for GCT’s 2025 earnings is pegged at $3.20 per share, unchanged in the past seven days. The company has a Growth Score of B and a trailing four-quarter earnings surprise of 45.6%, on average.

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This article originally published on Zacks Investment Research (zacks.com).

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