Analyst initiations: Technology and services sector, CTSH, INFY and SILC

MOST NOTEWORTHY: The technology and services sector, Cognizant, Infosys Technologies and Silicom Ltd were today's noteworthy initiations:

Wachovia initiated shares of Dell (NASDAQ: DELL), Micron (NYSE: MU) and Nokia (NYSE: NOK) with Outperform ratings and IBM (NYSE: IBM), AMD (NYSE: AMD) and Motorola (NYSE: MOT) with Market Perform ratings.
CIBC started shares of Cognizant (NASDAQ: CTSH) and Infosys (NASDAQ: INFY) with Sector Outperformer ratings and a $100 target and $60 target, respectively. The firm views risk/reward as favorable.
Merriman initiated Silicom Ltd (NASDAQ: SILC) with a Neutral rating, citing valuation and low visibility into the quarter.

OTHER INITIATIONS:

BMO Capital started shares of Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL) with an Outperform rating.
Solei initiated Lincoln Electric (NASDAQ: LECO) with a Buy rating and $114 target.
Merrill initiated Northwest Airlines (NYSE: NWA) with a Buy rating and $23 target.

Tags: aapl, amd, analyst, apple, cognizant, ctsh, dell, ibm, infosys, infy, initiation, leco, lincoln electric, LincolnElectric, micron, mot, motorola, mu, nok, nokia, northwest, nwa, silc, silicom

10-04-2007 @ 6:19PM

What about the story from the NY Times on the possibility that NW and Delta might attempt a merger? http://dealbook.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/10/04/is-northwest-flying-toward-a-spinoff/ According to a Knowledge Map from NewsVisual the current Delta CEO was CEO at NW until 2004 http://www.newsvisual.com/newsvisual/2007/10/ceo-ties-could-.html . Strong ties also exists through AGL Resources and Morehouse College (which is in Atlanta, HQ of Delta). Any chance their might be something to this rumor?