Analyst upgrades 3-06-07: Altria, AMD & Norvartis all upgraded today
Posted Mar 6th 2007 10:45AM by Kevin Shult
Filed under: Before the bell, Analyst upgrades and downgrades, Good news, Advanced Micro Dev (AMD), Altria Group (MO), Novartis AG ADS (NVS), Anheuser-Busch Cos (BUD)
MOST NOTEWORTHY: Novartis AG (NVS), Barnes & Noble, Inc (BKS), Altria Group (MO) and Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) were some of today's more notable upgrades:
- Credit Suisse upgraded Novartis AG (NYSE: NVS) to Neutral from Underperform on valuation and the approval of its drug Tekturna.
- Merrill Lynch upgraded shares of Barnes & Noble, Inc (NYSE: BKS) to Neutral from Sell on valuation.
- Deutsche Bank believes the recent weakness in Altria Group (NYSE: MO) presents a buying opportunity given the potential to unlock value, upgrading shares to Buy from Hold.
- JMP Securities upgraded shares of Advanced Micro Devices Inc (NYSE: AMD) to Market Outperform from Market Perform following checks that indicate the company's next-generation "Barcelona" quad-core server chip and next-generation low-power mobile PC processor chip is exhibiting excellent power, performance, scalability, and price/performance characteristics at key OEM customers.
OTHER UPGRADES:
- ThinkEquity upgraded Microchip Technology Inc (NASDAQ: MCHP) to Accumulate from Source of Funds following the company's improved guidance.
- Morgan Stanley upgraded Eni SpA (NYSE: E) to Equal-Weight from Underweight as they believe management made it clear that the dividend is sustainable and a large-scale acquisition is not forthcoming.
- JP Morgan upgraded Deutsche Telekom AG (NYSE: DT) to Neutral from Underweight citing management's new focus on customer service and expectation's for modest growth for the upgrade.
- AG Edwards upgraded Anheuser-Busch Companies Inc (NYSE: BUD) to Buy from Hold.
- Morgan Joseph upgraded Boyd Gaming Corp (NYSE: BYD) to Buy from Hold based on key markets the company operating in and its diversification.
- Bernstein upgraded Cablevision Systems Corp (NYSE: CVC) upgraded to Outperform from Market Perform.
Analyst summaries provided by TheFlyOnTheWall.com (subscription required). Tags: advanced micro, AdvancedMicro, altria, amd, analyst, anheuser, barnes, bks, body, bud, byd, cablevision systems, CablevisionSystems, cvc, deutsche, dt, eni spa, EniSpa, mchp, microchip tech, MicrochipTech, mo, novartis, nvs, rating, rating change, RatingChange, theflyonthewall.com
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