Shares in the Jefferies Group, a NYSE-listed company soared 22.88% on Tuesday, riding the momentum of a positive earnings report for the fiscal quarter just ended.  Needless to say, JEF was the top performing stock in the Compliance Insights Financial Index.  Deutsche Bank was a distant 2nd, rising 8% for the day. Jefferies deserved this break-out session - after watching its shares lose 42% of their value these past 3 months.  Most of the loss was incurred in the first half of November, right after MF Global imploded. That's when many on the Street put out a "death watch" on Jefferies - because it too had invested heavily in European sovereign debt.  It turned out the firm did have a large position in that debt - but it survived and is optimistic about its future. Making Lemonade Out of Lemons. Well, not only did the firm weather the storm - it survived, it made a sizable profit out of its predicament by repurchasing 5.1 million of its shares on the open market.  Following that success, the Jefferies Board approved the buyback of an additional 14.9 million shares.   But that was before the 23% jump in share price on Tuesday. However, with new-found optimism, momentum and investor support, the firm probably can still make a profit if it repurchased shares at these lofty price. Kudos to firm management for displaying tremendous strength throughout. [TheFlyOnTheWall, 12/20/11]