Weaker Opening
Stocks appear set to open lower
Thursday.
Smith International
(
SII |
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PowerRating) expects
Q1 earnings to come in the low 60 cents range. The company sees revenues falling
about 4% to about $830 million. Analysts’ consensus was for 63 cents in earnings
and $844 million in revenues.
The European Central Bank and the Bank
of England have left interest rates unchanged.
Microsoft’s
(
MSFT |
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PowerRating) president and
chief operating officer resigned on the heels of the software giant’s
announcement to restructure.
Atmel Corp
(
ATML |
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News |
PowerRating) was downgraded
by AG Edwards from Strong Buy to Hold due to the stock’s valuation.
Credit Suisse First Boston upgraded
Mercury Interactive
(
MERQ |
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News |
PowerRating) from Buy to Strong Buy. The firm believes the
company’s fundamentals are stable and that the risk/reward at the current price
is compelling.
Merrill Lynch lowered its ratings on
chemical stocks based on assumptions that a strong recovery could lead to
interest rates rising, thus causing rotation out of the chemical group into
growth.
JP Morgan lowered its rating on RadioShack
(
RSH |
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News |
PowerRating) from Long Term Buy to Market Perform after the firm
extensively reviewed RSH’s 10-K.
UBS Warburg lowered its rating on
Invacare Corp
(
IVC |
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News |
PowerRating) from Buy to Hold due to the company’s valuation.
The
firm has a price target of $37.
Sonic Wall
(
SNWL |
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PowerRating) lowered its Q1
outlook and expects profits to come in between 2 cents and 3 cents a share vs. Multex estimates of 9 cents a share. SNWL sees sales of between $28 to
$29 million, while consensus was for $34.9 million.
Terra Lycos
(
TRLY |
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PowerRating) was downgraded
by Bear Stearns from Buy to Neutral.
Planar Systems
(
PLNR |
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PowerRating) warned that
Q2 earnings will come in between 14 cents and 16 cents a share vs. consensus
of 23 cents a share. The company expects sales to come in the range of $48 to
$50 million, compared with the consensus of $43.5 million.
Knight Trading
(
NITE |
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News |
PowerRating) warned of a
loss for Q1 to come in between 10 cents and 12 cents due to international
expansion and non-recurring items. Analysts expected NITE to post profits of 9
cents for the quarter.
Lehman Brothers said that Intersil
(
ISIL |
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Chart |
News |
PowerRating)
should be one of the top performers in 2002 due to the company’s strength in the
analog/WLAN area.