Both General Mills (GIS | Quote | Chart | News | PowerRating) and R.R. Donnelley & Sons (RRD | Quote | Chart | News | PowerRating) have tacked on a point in terms of their Long Term PowerRatings, making both stocks that much more attractive to investors and long-term traders looking for stocks that are likely to be higher in a year's time.

General Mills now has a Long Term PowerRating of 9. The upgrade to R.R. Donnelley & Sons gives that stock a Long Term PowerRating of 8.

How significant are these upgrades? In the case of General Mills, a stock we have talked about before in our Featured Stock Spotlight, we are seeing a stock that now belongs to a class of stocks that has been higher one year later more than 79% of the time. Compared to the average stock, which between 1995 and 2007 was higher one year later less than 68% of the time, this is a distinction worth noting for General Mills.

In addition to being more reliable than the average stock, General Mills is more likely to outperform as well. Our research, which looked at thousands and thousands of trades, found that stocks that had the same Long Term PowerRating of 9 that General Mills has just earned, averaged a gain of more than 18% after one year. Compare this to the average stock, which tended to gain between 12-13% in a year's time.

General Mills is a relatively known stock from an industry, Processed and Packaged Goods, which has more than a few high Long Term PowerRatings stocks in it. Some of those stocks include: Kellogg (K | Quote | Chart | News | PowerRating), Pepsico (PEP | Quote | Chart | News | PowerRating), Sara Lee (SLE | Quote | Chart | News | PowerRating), JM Smucker (SJM | Quote | Chart | News | PowerRating) and McCormick & Company (MKC | Quote | Chart | News | PowerRating).

Our other upgraded stock, however, is relatively less well-known R.R. Donnelley & Sons. This company is in the printing business and works primarily with business printing processes, logistics and distribution services. Their business lines include customers in the book publishing, direct mail, financial, retailing and telecommunications industries.

Shares of R.R.Donnelley & Sons have just been upgraded from an average Long Term PowerRating of 7 to an 8. While not as impressive as the performance of 9-rated stocks like General Mills, our research suggests that 8-rated stocks are still a superior place for investors and long-term traders to put their money compared to the average stock.

Keeping in mind the reliability and average performance figures for the average stock noted above, consider the fact that 8-rated stocks from 1995 to 2007 have been higher one year later more than 74% of the time. These stocks have also tended to outperform the average stock by a significant margin, averaging a gain of more than 17% after one year.

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David Penn is Senior Editor at PowerRatings.net.