Analyst downgrades 5-31-07: Ethanol producers to Sell

MOST NOTEWORTHY: Ethanol producers Novacea, Inc. (NOVC) and Aimco (AIV) were today's noteworthy downgrades:

Banc of America downgraded shares of Andersons Inc. (NASDAQ: ANDE) to Neutral from Buy, as well as VeraSun Energy (NYSE: VSE), Pacific Ethanol (NASDAQ: PEIX) and Aventine Renewable Energy (NYSE: AVR) to Sell from Neutral. The firm believes new ethanol supply will depress ethanol's premium to gasoline, drive corn prices higher and pressure distillers' grains values.
Novacea Inc. (NASDAQ: NOVC) was downgraded to Peer Perform from Outperform at Bear Stearns based on valuation and lack of catalysts until 2H08; the firm believes the company's deal with Schering-Plough (NYSE: SGP) is a positive.
Aimco Properties (NYSE: AIV) was downgraded to Underweight from Equal Weight at Lehman, as the firm does not view AIV as an attractive takeover target.

OTHER UPGRADES:

EMC Corp. (NYSE: EMC) was downgraded to Peer Perform from Outperform at Bear Stearns based on valuation.
UBS downgraded shares of Iomai Corp. (NASDAQ: IOMI) and ICICI Bank (NYSE: IBN) to Neutral from Buy.
Goldman Sachs downgraded Parexel Intl. (NASDAQ: PRXL) to Neutral from Buy and PRA International (NASDAQ: PRAI) to Sell from Neutral.
Janus Capital Group (NYSE: JNS) was downgraded to Neutral from Buy at Merrill Lynch.
Security Bank (NASDAQ: SBKC) was downgraded to Hold from Buy at Sandler, O'Neill & Partners on valuation.
Bradley Pharmaceuticals (NYSE: BDY) was downgraded to Hold from Buy on valuation at Matrix USA.

Analyst summaries provided by TheFlyOnTheWall.com (subscription required).

Tags: ANDE, AVR, BDY, EMC, IBN, IOMI, JNS, NOVC, PEIX, PRAI, PRXL, SBKC, SGP, VSE

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