Tag Archives: Canaccord Genuity

Business, Finance, Occupation & Industry

Should You Buy Reckitt Benckiser Today?

Leave a comment

By Royston Wild, The Motley Fool

Filed under:

LONDON — I believe that shares in Reckitt Benckiser  are vastly overpriced and are overdue for a weighty correction. The stock has risen 19% since the turn of the year, and currently trades at a 35% premium to Canaccord Genuity‘s 3,425 pence target price.

The firm is a giant in the household cleaning product and non-prescription health-care space and whose global brands include Dettol, Clearasil, Nurofen, and Durex, among others. But in my opinion, its loss of exclusivity on its Suboxone drug — which is used to combat narcotics addiction — could harm revenues moving forward and sour investor appetite for the company.

Rivals gear up for assault
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) halted Reckitt Benckiser‘s patent on the anti-addiction product, a move that will herald the entry of cheaper, generic rivals to the Suboxone brand and harm sales over the medium to long term. Suboxone tablet sales in the U.S. represented around 5% of the firm’s total revenues last year, while film made up closer to 10% of group turnover.

Indeed, BioDelivery Sciences International announced last month that it plans to file an NDA with the FDA for its Bunavail film by July, which is considered a massive threat to Suboxone moving forward. It reckons that the new film could grab between 25% and 35% of the branded market, and plans to launch the product next year.

Earnings pressure set to materialize
Broker Liberum Capital expects earnings per share (EPS) to nudge 1% lower in 2013 to 262 pence, before the effect of falling Suboxone revenues drive EPS 4% lower to 252 pence. The company currently trades on a price-to-earnings (P/E) ratio of 17.7 and 18.5 for this year and next, trading at a premium to a forward earnings multiple of 14.5 for the wider household goods and home construction sector.

Reckitt Benckiser has steadily built the dividend in recent years — 2012’s 134 pence shareholder payout was up 7% from the previous year — but yields are expected to remain around the 3.3% FTSE 100 average over the medium term. A figure of 3.1% and 3.3% are expected by Liberum’s analysts in 2013 and 2014, respectively.

These prospective payments provide coverage just below the safety watermark of two times for these years, although I believe that the effect of falling earnings could cast doubt on the progress of its dividend policy moving forward.

The prescription for plump returns
Although Reckitt Benckiser presents too much risk in my opinion, check out this newly updated special report that highlights a host of other FTSE winners identified by ace fund manager Neil Woodford.

Woodford — head of U.K. Equities at Invesco Perpetual — has more than 30 years’ experience in the industry, and has identified two other fantastic pharmaceutical specialists in the report set to deliver spectacular investor returns.

The report, compiled by The Motley Fool’s crack team of analysts, is totally free and comes with no further obligation. Click here now to download your copy.

link

The article Should You Buy

Source: FULL ARTICLE at DailyFinance

Business, Finance, Occupation & Industry

Should I Buy Polymetal International?

Leave a comment

By Harvey Jones, The Motley Fool

Filed under:

LONDON — I’m window shopping for shares again, and there are plenty of goodies for sale. Should I pop Polymetal International  into my basket?

Go West, go East
Russian gold and silver producer Polymetal International sought the greater security of a FTSE 100 listing in 2011 in a bid to attract a wider investor base, boost liquidity and reduce political risk. I’m tempted by the prospect of Western standards of corporate governance and Eastern growth potential. Should I buy it?

Polymetal International’s share price has plummeted nearly 25% over the past six months, but publication of its preliminary 2012 results earlier this week sparked a sudden 6% rebound. That’s down to its “strong operational performance”, which included a 31% rise in gold production and a 40% leap in revenues to $1.85 billion dollars. Adjusted EBITDA grew a forecast-busting 47% to $918 million. Polymetal also fulfilled its promise to pay 30% of net earnings to investors (up from 20% last year), paying 31 cents a share (on top of a special dividend of 50 cents in January). Management has floated the idea of making a special payment every December, if cash flow allows. Given its strong cash position, Polymetal could be a nice little income earner.

Gold bugs
This week, Polymetal also announced that it had completed its purchase of the Maminskoye gold deposit in Sverdlovks, Russia, which it claims has “substantial exploration upside”, and could yield between 80,000 and 120,000 ounces of gold a year. That’s another advantage of a FTSE 100 listing. It makes equity-based acquisitions easier.

Polymetal is sitting pretty, thanks to its strong financial performance, stable cash flow, solid margins and healthy return on capital, and is already on track to meet its gold production targets for 2013. Commodity stocks have struggled in recent months, but that could make now a buying opportunity. Polymetal currently trades at 13.2 times earnings, and although that isn’t dirt cheap, you aren’t paying over the odds, either. You get a forecast yield of 3.7%, and an exciting dividend policy. Projected earnings-per-share growth is a shiny 56% this year, followed by 15% in 2014.

Chinese arithmetic
Your decision to buy will partly depend on how bullish you are about the global recovery. But with central bankers competing to pump liquidity into the economy, and Chinese domestic consumption rising, the tide could be moving in favor of commodities. Brokers rate Polymetal. Canaccord Genuity names it a buy, with a target price of £14, Morgan Stanley is overweight on a target of £11.25. You can currently buy it for £9.

As with every miner, you have to understand the risks. This is a volatile sector. Polymetal is still relatively new to the FTSE 100 index, while three major shareholders continue to dominate its board. The gold price is down 10% over the last six months, and any serious decline could hit investor sentiment. But if you think metals are set to get more precious over the next

Source: FULL ARTICLE at DailyFinance

Business, Finance, Occupation & Industry

Best Investments for the Next 5 Years

Leave a comment

By Daniel Sparks, The Motley Fool

Filed under:

It’s nearly impossible to project anything five years out. If it were easy, we’d all know what stocks to put in our portfolio. Ironically, however, thinking long-term is a healthy habit for stock market investors. It filters out the noise and helps investors think about the underlying fundamentals that drive businesses over the long haul. In the next few paragraphs, I’ll uncover two stocks that could make some of the best investments over the next half-decade.

Apple
PC sales are declining, and smartphone and tablet sales are booming. If there’s one company that is sure to benefit from this trend over the next five years, it’s Apple. Yes, Apple may have lost market share over the last 12 months to Samsung, but it still captures the majority of worldwide smartphone profits. In fact, a recent study by Canaccord Genuity found that Apple took 72% of worldwide handset profits in the fourth quarter.

Another favorable factor for Apple: It is a cash cow. Even as the company’s margins continue to decline, it’s still adding far more money to its balance sheet than it’s paying out in dividends. In 2012 alone, the company earned $46.3 billion in free cash flow on $164.7 billion in revenue. Free cash flow, of course, is equal to cash provided by operations minus capital expenditures, so this is the cash Apple generated after it took care of its operating expenses and its long-term investments.

Though 2013 may have been tough on the stock so far, analysts, on average, expect earnings to increase at about 19% annually over the next five years.

Berkshire Hathaway
The Oracle of Omaha, Warren Buffett, seems to be on his A game — even at 82 years old. Berkshire Hathaway shares almost tripled the S&P 500‘s 11.8% return over the last 12 months, with a 30.1% gain. Even better, his lieutenants, Todd Combs and Ted Weschler, have both managed to outperform the S&P 500 by double-digit margins. In fact, they did better than Buffett himself, he admitted in the 2012 annual letter to shareholders.

Though it’s too early to tell whether Berkshire’s acquisition of H.J. Heinz will play out nicely, the outcomes of the company’s major acquisitions and purchases over the last five years have in time mostly silenced the naysayers who so eagerly criticized Buffett at the time of the purchases.

A case in point is the company’s largest acquisition ever: Burlington Northern Santa Fe, which it acquired in 2010 and turned out to be a significant success. In 2010, the company earned $2.45 billion; just two years later, the railroad contributed a whopping $3.37 billion to Berkshire’s earnings. Since Berkshire acquired BNSF, the Dow Jones U.S. Railroads Index has more than doubled the returns of the S&P 500, snapping up a return in excess of 80%.

Berkshire isn’t lacking in stock ideas, either. In 2011, Berkshire started picking up shares of IBM like nobody’s business. Now Berkshire owns 6.1% of the company. …read more

Source: FULL ARTICLE at DailyFinance

Business, Finance, Occupation & Industry

3 Mind-Boggling Facts for Apple Bulls

Leave a comment

By Daniel Sparks, The Motley Fool

Filed under:

Apple was slammed last week, with shares sliding more than 4%. In fact, the stock came just $0.68 from its 52-week low on Friday. Though the stock has regained some ground this week, there’s no denying that Apple has taken a beating since its September 2012 high around $700 per share. At these levels, the stock has officially entered value-investing territory. Three metrics, in particular, paint a mind-boggling picture of a severely undervalued, highly profitable stock.

Share of profits
Though Apple‘s three-month average market share of smartphones in the U.S. was up sequentially in February 2013 compared to November 2012, according to comScore, the company is undoubtedly losing market share on a year-over-year basis. Apple’s share of U.S. smartphone sales in the three-month period ending February 2013 declined to 43.5% from 47%. Meanwhile, Google‘s Android picked up the slack as its market share rose from 45.4% to 51.2%.

To be fair, Google’s Android is a free mobile operating system, or OS, that is available to any smartphone manufacturer. Nevertheless, Apple’s share of sales is declining.

This is where the first mind-boggling metric comes in. Though Apple is losing market share, its share of profits remains enormous. In the fourth quarter of 2012, for instance, Apple grabbed 72% of worldwide handset profits, according to Canaccord Genuity. Even more notable, that 72% of worldwide profits was achieved on just 21.7% of sales.

Market growth
Bears continue to line up to throw tomatoes at Apple, but no one can deny the enormous and fast-growing markets that Apple operates in. “Gartner expects the smartphone market to essentially double from 2011 to 2014, so Apple could see tremendous revenue growth even if it only grew at the market rate,” Morningstar analyst Brian Colello pointed out. Furthermore, tablet shipments are expected to grow by 70% in 2013 compared to 2012, according to the IT research company. Gartner also projects a sustained upward trend in sales, growing by 32% annually between 2012 and 2017.

FCF yield
Despite Apple‘s massive share of worldwide handset profits and a spectacular market outlook, the stock trades at an unjustifiably conservative valuation.

In a recent article, I compared Apple to slow-growth megacap stocks, including McDonald’s, Wal-Mart, Microsoft, and Intel, using the free cash flow yield — a great indicator of a stock‘s value. Of these four companies, the only one with a free cash flow yield as high as Apple’s (the higher it is, the cheaper the stock) was Microsoft — a company with stalling growth, whose Windows-based PC sales continue to decline. Apple’s FCF yield of 11.3% was more than twice as high as Wal-Mart’s and McDonald’s FCF yields, and 400 basis points higher than Intel’s.

Keeping the faith in strong fundamentals
It’s easy to point fingers at CEO Tim Cook or to criticize Apple for lack of innovation, but there is no denying the cash the company is producing. With indisputable leadership in terms …read more

Source: FULL ARTICLE at DailyFinance

Business, Finance, Occupation & Industry

Another Analyst Gets Even More Bullish on Qualcomm

Leave a comment

By Evan Niu, CFA, The Motley Fool

Filed under:

Following a bullish note on Qualcomm from Susquehanna analyst Chris Caso, the mobile chip giant is getting another analyst vote of approval today. This time, we’re talking about Canaccord Genuity analyst Mike Walkley boosting his estimates on Qualcomm’s prospects.

The analyst is reiterating a “buy” rating on the company while adding a couple bucks to his price target, bringing it to $85. Walkley believes that Qualcomm’s core businesses are holding up admirably to recent assaults from Broadcom , Intel, and NVIDIA . In fact, he’s even raising his market share estimates.

In February, Broadcom announced a new LTE baseband chip to target the discrete modem market, supporting next-generation technologies like LTE Advanced carrier aggregation. There is even speculation that Broadcom is looking to expand its relationship with Apple beyond Wi-Fi combo chips, and that the company was hoping to score another iPhone spot.

That same month, NVIDIA reached a major competitive milestone with its Tegra 4i. Previously code-named “Grey,” the Tegra 4i is NVIDIA‘s first applications processor with an integrated LTE modem. Qualcomm’s focus on integration has been a key driver of its smartphone market share gains, and NVIDIA wants a piece of that success.

Even though rivals are sampling competing chips this year, Canaccord believes that Qualcomm’s third-generation chipsets still boast considerable advantages to the first-generation silicon of other companies, particularly in areas like global and support and TD inclusion. LTE frequency fragmentation is also a tough nut to crack for newer entrants.

Like Caso, Walkley also sees Qualcomm benefiting greatly from Samsung’s new Galaxy S4. While only about a third of Galaxy S III variants were LTE enabled, the analyst estimates that two-thirds of Galaxy S4 variants will feature LTE connectivity. Qualcomm’s Snapdragon processors also seem to be in more Galaxy S4 variants this year instead of Samsung’s own Exynos. Add in the fact that Galaxy S4 units should come in at about 100 million over the next year, up from approximately 65 million Galaxy S III units to date, and you get a recipe for some healthy revenue upside.

NVIDIA was ahead of the curve launching its mobile Tegra processor, but investing gains haven’t followed as expected, with the company struggling to gain momentum in the smartphone market. The Motley Fool’s brand-new premium report examines NVIDIA‘s stumbling blocks, but also homes in on opportunities that many investors are overlooking. We’ll help you sort fact from fiction to determine whether NVIDIA is a buy at today’s prices. Simply click here now to unlock your copy of this comprehensive report.

var FoolAnalyticsData = FoolAnalyticsData || []; …read more

Source: FULL ARTICLE at DailyFinance

Business, Finance, Occupation & Industry

What's Fueling eBay's Rocket Ride Today?

Leave a comment

By Anders Bylund, The Motley Fool

Carbon Motors E7 police car prototype - front three-quarter view

This map of a massively larger market was a common sight in eBay’s analyst presentation.

Management expects the addressable market to grow tenfold as a result, and then it’s just a matter of converting potential clients to actual customers. “Our next 3-year journey is simply how do we capitalize in the opportunities that we have in front of us,” said CFO Robert Swan.

eBay is not alone in this retail rethinking, of course. The company matches wits with Amazon.com at every turn and with MercadoLibre in many of the most promising global markets. Here’s the silver lining to all this competition: There’s no reason why a $10-trillion market couldn’t support several thriving vendors. All three of these e-commerce innovators are winners in my book.

To learn about two retailers with especially good prospects, take a look at The Motley Fool‘s special free report: “

Filed under:

Online auctioneer eBay has jumped 3.5% as of 2 p.m. EDT on a pair of analyst upgrades.

Canaccord Genuity upgraded the stock from a hold to a buy, raising target prices from $56 to $67. Jefferies had already rated eBay a buy, but it upped its target from $62 to $66.

eBay shares are sniffing at 52-week and split-adjusted all-time highs in today’s action. Reaching the analysts’ new target prices would definitely push eBay investors past whatever entry prices they might have seen.

Wall Street absolutely loves this stock nowadays. According to StreetInsider, 32 of 41 eBay analysts pin a buy rating of the stock today, and the other nine consider it a hold. Nobody’s betting against the stock, even at these near-record prices. Even the shorting bears are staying at home, with only 0.8% of eBay’s float currently sold short.

Jefferies cited an upbeat analyst day as the catalyst for its target price boost. “We left eBay HQs encouraged by what we saw and heard from management (especially new [long-term] guidance that exceeded our and Street expectations),” said analyst Brian Pitz.

More specifically, eBay’s technology and business model have been adjusted to address “omnichannel retail” on all five continents. That means moving beyond the pure e-commerce market and becoming an enabler for any kind of commerce.

This map of a massively larger market was a common sight in eBay’s analyst presentation.

Management expects the addressable market to grow tenfold as a result, and then it’s just a matter of converting potential clients to actual customers. “Our next 3-year journey is simply how do we capitalize in the opportunities that we have in front of us,” said CFO Robert Swan.

eBay is not alone in this retail rethinking, of course. The company matches wits with Amazon.com at every turn and with MercadoLibre in many of the most promising global markets. Here’s the silver lining to all this competition: There’s no reason why a $10-trillion market couldn’t support several thriving vendors. All three of these e-commerce innovators are winners in my book.

To learn about two retailers with especially good prospects, take a look at The Motley Fool‘s special free report: “The Death of Wal-Mart: The Real Cash Kings Changing the Face of Retail.” In it, you’ll see how these two cash kings are able to consistently outperform and how they’re planning to ride the waves of retail’s changing tide. You can access it by clicking here.

The article What’s Fueling eBay’s Rocket Ride Today? originally appeared on Fool.com.

Fool contributor Anders Bylund holds no position in any company mentioned. Check out Anders’ bio and holdings or follow him on Twitter and Google+.
The Motley Fool owns shares of Amazon.com and eBay. Motley Fool newsletter services have recommended buying shares of MercadoLibre, eBay, and Amazon.com. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy. …read more
Source: FULL ARTICLE at DailyFinance

Business, Finance, Occupation & Industry

Thursday's Top Upgrades (and Downgrades)

Leave a comment

By Rich Smith, The Motley Fool

Filed under:

This series, brought to you by Yahoo! Finance, looks at which upgrades and downgrades make sense, and which ones investors should act on. Today, our headlines include a new buy rating for Zumiez , a higher price target for Home Depot , and a downgrade on Obagi Medical . Let’s dive right in.

Zumiez could zoom 
The day started off with a bright note for “action sports” retailer Zumiez. Ascendiant Capital initiated coverage of the stock with a buy rating Thursday, sending Zumiez shares up a full percentage point in morning trading. But could they zoom even higher than that?

It depends. On one hand, I have to say that Zumiez shares look very attractively priced relative to reported GAAP income. The stock costs about 18 times earnings, and analysts have it pegged for 18% annualized earnings growth over the next five years. On the face of it, this price looks fair — and gets fairer still when you notice that this valuation doesn’t even factor in how the stock‘s $97 million in net cash makes it even cheaper.

But that’s just the first hand. On the other hand, investors can’t be thrilled about the job Zumiez is doing with generating cash. Free cash flow at the retailer came to just $25 million over the past year — far short of the $42 million in “earnings” the company reported. Valued on free cash flow, and giving Zumiez credit for its cash in the bank, it gets an enterprise value-to-free cash flow ratio of about 25, which seems a bit steep for an 18% grower.

My advice: Leave this one on the rack for now. All retailers eventually go on sale. Zumiez, too, will become worth buying… at the right price.

Home Depot: Leave home without it?
Speaking of overpriced retailers: Home Depot. Analysts at Canaccord Genuity upped their price target on the stock this morning, saying HD shares should be worth about $61 a year from now. There’s just one problem with that, however. Home Depot shares currently cost $69! So while technically Canaccord is upping its price target on the stock, this sounds like mixed news at best for Home Depot shareholders.

So why didn’t Canaccord come out with a better price target? Maybe a buy rating as well, to go with it, instead of the half-hearted “hold” Canaccord currently rates the stock? The answer, I fear, is simple: Home Depot isn’t worth a buy rating. It might not even be worth $61, and certainly shouldn’t cost the $69 a share investors are paying for it today.

Here’s why: Home Depot shares cost 23 times earnings today, which is more than you’d ordinarily expect to pay for 14.5% annualized profits growth, even with Home Depot‘s generous 2.3% dividend yield to help bridge the gap in valuation. Or viewed under a most favorable light, Home Depot‘s superior ($5.7 billion) trailing free cash flow works out to a price-to-FCF ratio of 18… which …read more
Source: FULL ARTICLE at DailyFinance

Business, Finance, Occupation & Industry

Intuitive Surgical: Even the Downside Has an Upside

Leave a comment

By Anders Bylund, The Motley Fool

Filed under:

Shares of Intuitive Surgical jumped as much as 5.4% in early Monday action, driven by an analyst upgrade.

Canaccord Genuity analyst Jason Mills upgraded the robotic surgery specialist from “hold” to “buy,” but also lowered its price target from $590 to $527.

The Intuitive Surgical da Vinci Si system in action.

A recent wave of criticism toward robotic surgery had caused the stock to fall 19% from recent January highs. Mills walked through protests from various surgical interest groups, but then countered with a group of minimally invasive surgery experts speaking in defense of robotic options. The group found “a substantial cost benefit to the patient and to society which has not been acknowledged,” and Mills thought it was a “logical and powerful pushback” to negative analyses.

Mills then performed two sets of alternative valuation analysis to supplement his former $590 price target and $17.90 full-year earnings estimate per share. One scenario assumed the worst — “the pressures in 2013 are systemic” and order volumes will weaken even further in 2014. Another called for hospitals delaying system orders and some procedures until the current storm of negative press subsides, but assumed that there’s nothing wrong with the basic business model or product lines.

Canaccord Model

2-Year Earnings CAGR Estimate

Price Target

Current

19%

$590

Moderate Downside

17%

$517

Significant Downside

16%

$474

Averaging out these scenarios, Mills landed at his $527 price target which carried a 15% upside at the time of publication. The worst-case scenario, in Miller’s view, still left a small margin of safety against current share prices. Therefore, the upside outweighs the downside and the stock becomes a buy. Canaccord has rated Intuitive Surgical as a “hold” for the last three years, so it’s not like Mr. Mills is defending some old party line here.

Intuitive is one of my largest personal holdings, and I agree that the stock looks like a buy at today’s prices. The stock is a play on the medical needs of the enormous Baby Boomer generation, with the added bonus of disrupting traditional surgeries in a big way.

I do appreciate Mills going through various valuation scenarios, but I’m far more interested in his analysis of various studies on patient outcomes. The valuation models only describe expected returns for the next nine months, and I intend to own this stock for another decade or more. In that view, Mills didn’t see any reason to believe that robotic surgery will fall out of fashion anytime soon.

Numbers never tell the whole story for long-term investors.

Are stories of this demise greatly exaggerated?
Recently, some investors have questioned Intuitive Surgical‘s future. However, Intuitive Surgical expert Karl Thiel believes a visible path to long-term growth persists. Will Intuitive capitalize, or be crushed by unforeseen pitfalls? His report highlights all of the key opportunities and risks facing the company — and includes a full year of ongoing updates as key new hits — …read more
Source: FULL ARTICLE at DailyFinance

Business, Finance, Occupation & Industry

Globus Medical to Present at the Canaccord Genuity Musculoskeletal Conference

Leave a comment

By Business Wirevia The Motley Fool

Filed under:

Globus Medical to Present at the Canaccord Genuity Musculoskeletal Conference

AUDUBON, Pa.–(BUSINESS WIRE)– Globus Medical, Inc. (NYS: GMED) , a leading spinal implant manufacturer, today announced that Dave Demski, President and Chief Operating Officer, and Richard Baron, Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer, will present at the 2013 Canaccord Genuity Musculoskeletal Conference on Tuesday, March 19, 2013 at 2:30 p.m. ET (1:30 PM CT) at the Westin Michigan Avenue, in Chicago, IL.

Interested institutional investors that wish to schedule a meeting should contact Canaccord Genuity.

About Globus Medical, Inc.

Globus Medical, Inc. is a leading spinal implant company based in Audubon, PA. The company was founded in 2003 by an experienced team of spine professionals with a shared vision to create products that enable spine surgeons to promote healing in patients with spinal disorders. Additional information can be accessed at www.globusmedical.com.

Globus Medical, Inc.
Ed Joyce, 610-930-1800
investors@globusmedical.com
www.globusmedical.com

KEYWORDS:   United States  North America  Pennsylvania

INDUSTRY KEYWORDS:

The article Globus Medical to Present at the Canaccord Genuity Musculoskeletal Conference originally appeared on Fool.com.

Try any of our Foolish newsletter services free for 30 days. We Fools may not all hold the same opinions, but we all believe that considering a diverse range of insights makes us better investors. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.

Copyright © 1995 – 2013 The Motley Fool, LLC. All rights reserved. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.

(function(c,a){window.mixpanel=a;var b,d,h,e;b=c.createElement(“script”);
b.type=”text/javascript”;b.async=!0;b.src=(“https:”===c.location.protocol?”https:”:”http:”)+
‘//cdn.mxpnl.com/libs/mixpanel-2.2.min.js’;d=c.getElementsByTagName(“script”)[0];
d.parentNode.insertBefore(b,d);a._i=[];a.init=function(b,c,f){function d(a,b){
var c=b.split(“.”);2==c.length&&(a=a[c[0]],b=c[1]);a[b]=function(){a.push([b].concat(
Array.prototype.slice.call(arguments,0)))}}var g=a;”undefined”!==typeof f?g=a[f]=[]:
f=”mixpanel”;g.people=g.people||[];h=[‘disable’,’track’,’track_pageview’,’track_links’,
‘track_forms’,’register’,’register_once’,’unregister’,’identify’,’alias’,’name_tag’,
‘set_config’,’people.set’,’people.increment’];for(e=0;e<h.length;e++)d(g,h[e]);
a._i.push([b,c,f])};a.__SV=1.2;})(document,window.mixpanel||[]);
mixpanel.init("9659875b92ba8fa639ba476aedbb73b9");

function addEvent(obj, evType, fn, useCapture){
if (obj.addEventListener){
obj.addEventListener(evType, fn, useCapture);
return true;
…read more
Source: FULL ARTICLE at DailyFinance

Business, Finance, Occupation & Industry

Strong IPO Debut for Silver Spring Networks

Leave a comment

By 24/7 Wall St.

Hand plugging ethernet cable into wall socket

Filed under: ,

Silver Spring Networks Inc. (NYSE: SSNI) is another strong debut for initial public offerings in 2013. Shares opened up 29% at $21.15, versus the price of $17.00 per share. Silver Spring sold only 4.75 million shares in the offering, and the price range was $16 to $18 per share. Even the number of shares was about 1 million more than expected.

This IPO was important because it has been on the books for about eight months. Silver Spring operates a hardware and software network platform that is designed to help utilities create and operate a smarter grid that allows for more remote monitoring of meters and allows consumers to see their power consumption.

Goldman Sachs and Credit Suisse were the joint book-running managers, and co-managers were listed as Piper Jaffray, Stifel Nicolaus, Robert W. Baird, Canaccord Genuity, Evercore Group and Pacific Crest Securities. The underwriters have a 30-day overallotment option to purchase up to an additional 712,500 shares at the same terms as the IPO. It is a safe assumption that the underwriting syndicate exercised its overallotment option.

Silver Spring has traded some 2.8 million shares, and the stock is trading at $21.00 as of 10:25 a.m. EST.

Filed under: 24/7 Wall St. Wire, Infrastructure, IPOs & Secondaries Tagged: SSNI

Read | Permalink | Email this | Linking Blogs | Comments

…read more
Source: FULL ARTICLE at DailyFinance

Business, Finance, Occupation & Industry

Friday's Top Upgrades (and Downgrades)

Leave a comment

By Rich Smith, The Motley Fool

Filed under:

This series, brought to you by Yahoo! Finance, looks at which upgrades and downgrades make sense, and which ones investors should act on. Today, our headlines include higher price targets for each of boot maker Deckers and clothier Gap . But it’s not all good news, so let’s start off with a quick look at how…

Con-Way ended up in a ditch
The week’s ending on a bleak note for Con-Way shareholders, as investment banker Stifel Nicolaus withdraws its endorsement from the shares, and downgrades to “hold.”

Con-Way, you see, presented at a transportation industry investors conference that Stifel hosted in Florida a couple of weeks back. While we don’t know exactly what Con-Way told the attendees, whatever it was, it apparently failed to impress Stifel. And so, after waiting a polite two weeks for Con-Way to get out of earshot, Stifel began warning investors away from the stock today.

And rightly so.

Oh, sure, at first glance I admit that Con-Way shares look attractive. The near-19% annualized earnings growth projections of Wall Street analysts appear to justify a high price — maybe even the 18.7 P/E these shares bear. But look a little deeper, and you’ll find some serious issues with Con-Way’s stock.

For example, the company’s carrying about $750 million in debt. Added to the market cap, that would push the stock‘s P/E up past 26, a price too high for the growth rate to justify. Even worse, the earnings that Con-Way boasts are of exceedingly low quality. Free cash flow at the firm amounted to just $18.3 million last year — a far cry from the reported $104 million GAAP earnings figure. Valued on free cash, the stock sells for an enterprise value-to-FCF ratio of 147, meaning it’s vastly overpriced for its prospects… and deserving of an even stronger rebuke than a mere downgrade to “hold.”

Gap-ing up 
Better news greeted Gap shareholders today, as analysts at Canaccord Genuity responded to Thursday’s earnings beat by upping their price target to $39 a share. Gap reported earning $0.73 a share on 5% comps growth, beating analyst estimates for both earnings and revenues, and dropping the P/E down to 14.3.

Even better, and in contrast to Con-Way, when valued on its superior free cash flow of $1.3 billion annually, Gap shares are actually a bit cheaper than they appear on the surface. Priced at 11.6 times free cash flow, with a 1.6% dividend yield and a 9.4% projected growth rate, Gap shares look close to fairly valued to me — and to Canaccord, too, apparently, because despite raising its target price, the analyst maintained a hold rating on the stock.

Granted, that doesn’t argue particularly strongly in favor of Canaccord’s prediction that the stock will gain another 15%. But at least it suggests the stock has little downside from today’s share price.

Deckers clicks
 Last but not least, we come to Uggs boot maker Deckers, recipient of a similar hike …read more
Source: FULL ARTICLE at DailyFinance

Science & Technology

Not Even Alicia Keys Can Save BlackBerry As Supply Constraints Cap Sales

Leave a comment

By Agustino Fontevecchia

Research in Motion mounted an impressive rally over the past few months in anticipation to the release of its new BlackBerry 10 smartphones, yet investors may havebeen irrationally exuberant. Recent channel checks by Canaccord Genuity suggest sales have dramatically underperformed previous estimates, mainly because of supply constraints and limited support from carriers. While the product may look good, it will be difficult for RIM?s Z10s and Q10s to compete with a host of new Android and Window phones, and possibly a new iPhone expected in the first half of 2013, according to Canaccord?s analysts. …read more
Source: FULL ARTICLE at Forbes Technology

Business, Finance, Occupation & Industry

Slew of Analyst Upgrades Driving Chip Stocks (ALTR, ATML, CY, ONN, XLNX)

Leave a comment

By 24/7 Wall St.

94073253

Filed under: ,

It was not that long ago that we saw a research report from Credit Suisse calling the chip sector at an “irresistible cyclical bottom.” Now we have a slew of analyst reports driving shares higher in the semiconductor sector on Tuesday. Chip stocks are responding well, as you will see.

Altera Corp. (NASDAQ: ALTR) was reiterated with a Buy rating and the price target was raised by $4 to $42, based on demand recovery and the possibility of a higher dividend. Shares are up 1.8% at $36.39, against a 52-week range of $29.59 to $40.31.

Atmel Corp. (NASDAQ: ATML) was raised to Buy from Hold at Needham with a price target of $10 on the stock. Shares are up 1.8% at $7.30, against a 52-week range of $4.37 to $10.73.

Cypress Semiconductor Corp. (NASDAQ: CY) was raised to Buy from Hold by Needham, and the price target is $13.00 per share. The upgrade is based in part on valuation and in part due to improving conditions in the SRAM chip market. Shares of Cypress are up 5% at $10.35, against a 52-week range of $8.70 to $18.70.

ON Semiconductor Corp. (NASDAQ: ONNN) was reiterated as Buy at Canaccord Genuity with a $10 price target. The firm is increasing estimates on an improved target model from analysts’ day, with higher gross and operating margin targets versus the prior model, leading to higher earnings estimates. Upside to revenue may be driven by strength for handsets and autos, followed by improving industrial and white goods demand. Shares are up 1.4% at $8.57, against a 52-week range of $5.70 to $9.44.

Xilinx Inc. (NASDAQ: XLNX) is surging after Bank of America/Merrill Lynch raised its price target by $7 to $45 per share and raised the rating to Buy from Hold. The upgrade is driven by the 4G LTE wireless build out, IP broadband, data center upgrades and improving industrial demand.

Filed under: 24/7 Wall St. Wire, Analyst Calls, Semiconductor, Semiconductors, Technology, Technology Companies Tagged: ALTR, ATML, CY, ONNN, XLNX

Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments

…read more
Source: FULL ARTICLE at DailyFinance

Business, Finance, Occupation & Industry

After the Fall: Akamai's Future Prospects Look Less Certain With Chart View

Leave a comment

By 24/7 Wall St.

global network concept

Filed under: ,

Akamai Technologies, Inc. (NASDAQ: AKAM) is down so much after earnings that investors are not going to just question its growth opportunities. The investment community has to be wondering just how valuable the company is now that the cloud and other “me too” services can threaten its future.

Our big concern here is not just an earnings issue as earnings were above estimates on the bottom line. It is also a future sales risk issue. Revenue was up almost 17% to $378 million and its fourth quarter profit of $98 million was up about 18%. While this was just under expectations on sales, the real issue is that sales in the quarter ahead were put in a range of $352 to $362 million versus an estimate of $369.8 million. That shows negative sequential sales and a wider miss projected versus the $3 million or so shortfall seen in the fourth quarter against consensus sales estimates from Wall Street analysts.

What we are seeing is starting to feel like a demand shift under a new CEO. The press release looked pretty good and the comments were mostly “feel good” comments. When you get  to guidance and outside comments the game changes quite a bit. Janney cut the rating to Neutral and Jefferies cut the rating to Hold, both of which previously had “buy” theme ratings before the news.

On the flip side, Canaccord Genuity maintained a “buy” rating with a $45 price target. It even calls the pullback an attractive entry point where the bar is being set very low for future upside surprises.

In 2012 Akamai spent $141 million buying back stock and it has extended that buyback plan to up to a total of $150 million more for buybacks. Akamai had over $1 billion of cash, cash equivalents and marketable securities as of year-end. This will help control dilution of course, but the recent growth patterns and history of Akamai is one where investors might not really want to see it just buy down its share count.

Our fear for this company is that competitive pressure in the cloud may be drastically changing the “good enough” and “fast enough” internet. When we were all using desktops and laptops with lightning-fast web connections we all demanded more and more speed and faster and faster content delivery. If you are using a 3G or 4G network on a smartphone or on a tablet, let’s just go ahead and admit that speed is not complained about as much. This is a huge opportunity for Akamai but it may pose the risks of a race to zero as well.

Akamai shares are down over 15.5% at $35.10 after closing at $41.58 the prior day on what is closing in on ten-times normal volume of 22 million shares today. The 52-week trading range is $25.90 to $42.53, and the market cap is still $6.23 billion. If the consensus revenue estimates have any value today, Akamai’s Thomson Reuters estimates are almost $1.6 billion in …read more
Source: FULL ARTICLE at DailyFinance