Analyst downgrades: BTI, DVW, PCBC, VLCM and AMMD

Posted Oct 30th 2007 11:00AM by Eric Buscemi
Filed under: Analyst Reports, Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades, Las Vegas Sands (LVS)

MOST NOTEWORTHY: British American Tobacco, Covad Communications, Pacific Capital, Volcom and American Medical Systems were today's noteworthy downgrades:

Goldman downgraded shares of British American Tobacco (NYSE: BTI) to Neutral from Buy on valuation.
Covad Communications (NYSE: DVW) was lowered to Hold from Buy at Jefferies. The firm downgraded shares after Platinum Equity Holdings agreed to acquire the company.
Keefe Bruyette downgraded Pacific Capital Bancorp (NASDAQ: PCBC) to Market Perform from Outperform following its Q3 credit loss pre-announcement.
ThinkEquity reduced Volcom (NASDAQ: VLCM) to Accumulate from Buy following its reduced guidance.
American Medical Systems (NASDAQ: AMMD) was downgraded to Market Perform from Outperform at Raymond James and at Piper Jaffray. Piper downgraded shares following the lower-than-expected Q3 results. Shares were also downgraded to Hold from Buy at Stifel following the weak Q3 report.

OTHER DOWNGRADES:

Citigroup downgraded Mechel OAO (NYSE: MTL) to Hold from Buy.
Hutchison Telecommunications (NYSE: HTX) was downgraded to Neutral from Overweight at JP Morgan.
Las Vegas Sands (NYSE: LVS) was downgraded to Market Perform from Outperform at BMO Capital.

Tags: american medical, AmericanMedical, ammd, analyst, british american tobacco, BritishAmericanTobacco, bti, covad, downgrades, dvw, htx, hutchison, las vegas sands, LasVegasSands, lvs, mechel, mtl, pacific capital, PacificCapital, pcbc