With the major averages dropping like stones and investors seeing a sea of red on their computer screens, you might think there aren't any winning stocks out there right now. But that's where you'd be wrong. There are always winners hiding somewhere -- it's just a little harder to find them in a market like this.

Correction: a lot harder.

Out of all 21,000 actively-traded equities on U.S. exchanges, just over 1,500 are up since the market began to fall through Wednesday's close. That's only 7%, in case you were wondering.

But as Jim Cramer says, there's always a bull market somewhere.If there's anything we've learned in the two years since the onset of the financial crisis, it's that the market can turn south in a big way at any time. So, in order to be prepared for another gap down, we set out to find the stocks that held strong in this most recent sell-off. Perhaps we can see some patterns that could give us clues to surviving the next time around.

Our methods: We screened for stocks trading on U.S. exchanges with a market capitalization of over $250 million that have closed higher since April 23rd. Our result: 233 stocks. Slim pickings, but it just might do.

Here is a breakdown of the top five sectors in our results:

Health Care: 36
Information Technology: 36
Consumer Discretionary: 36
Materials: 25
Telecommunications: 9

And here are the Top 20 specific firms, along with their total returns: