MOST NOTEWORTHY: MoneyGram (MGI), F5 Networks (FFIV), ARK Restaurants (ARKR), Nara Bancorp (NARA) and St. Jude Medical (STJ) were today's noteworthy initiations:

• AG Edwards initiated MoneyGram (NYSE: MGI) with a Buy rating because it believes the recent pullback in the shares provides an attractive entry point; Stephens started shares of MoneyGram with an Overweight rating, and believes the company is well positioned to create strong transactional growth and take market share.

• CIBC expects F5 Networks (NASDAQ: FFIV) to benefit from strong fundamentals in application networking solutions and started shares with a Sector Outperformer rating and $85 target.

• Morgan Joseph initiated ARK Restaurants (NASDAQ: ARKR) with a Buy rating and $43 target; they believe ARK is well positioned to benefit from strong SSS & earnings leverage given its strong store locations, wide ranging price points, and stable unit development pipeline.

• Sandler is positive on Nara Bancorp (NASDAQ: NARA), starting shares with a Buy rating and $17 target, based on the company's long-term prospects.

• ThinkEquity believes St. Jude Medical (NYSE: STJ) is poised to take market share in the ICD markets and started shares with a Buy rating and $56 target...

OTHER INITIATIONS:

• JP Morgan initiated Softbank (OTC: SFTBF) with an Underweight rating and Nippon Telegraph & Telephone (NYSE: NTT) with a Neutral rating.

• Goldman reinstated Bausch & Lomb (NYSE: BOL) with a Neutral rating.

• Banc of America initiated PharMerica (NYSE: PMC) with a Buy rating and $18 target.

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

Daily Option Update is provided by Stock Options Specialist Paul Foster of theflyonthewall.com.

Bausch & Lomb-(NYSE: BOL) volatility suggests slightly larger Risk on renewed chatter. BOL, is recently up $3.55 to $58.47, on renewed takeover chatter. BOL has a market cap of $3.15 billion with long term debt of $831 million. BOL has cash & short term investment of $731 million. BOL May option implied volatility of 30 is near its 26-week average of 28 according to Track Data, suggesting slightly larger price risks.

Microsoft-(NASDAQ: MSFT) implied volatility suggests non-directional Risk into 4/26 EPS. MSFT will report EPS on 4/26/07. McAdams Wright Ragen has a Buy rating with a $35 price target on MSFT. MCAD says: "We expect FY08 guidance to be in the range of existing estimates and expect no major surprises." MSFT option implied volatility of 22 is near its 26-week average according to Track Data, suggesting non-directional risk.

Option volume leaders today are: MedImmune Inc. (NASDAQ: MEDI), Dendreon Corp. (NASDAQ: DNDN) and Apple, Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL).

This post is written as part of AOL Money & Finance's Best & Worst 2006. If you think this was the dumbest moment in business, cast your vote.

Bausch & Lomb's (NYSE:BOL) stock still hasn't recovered from its bungled management of rumored product contamination earlier this year.

I say rumored because the FDA never found conclusive evidence that the company's MoistureLoc solution directly caused serious fungal eye infections. But the company's slow-motion response to a growing chorus of suspicious infections cost it dearly in the end. The product was pulled from the Asian market in February, and the American market on April 13. A worldwide recall was issued May 15.

The company's stance was that there was nothing found in the various FDA inspections. But it was like talking into a gale force wind. The circumstantial evidence piled up. February 15 saw the stock at $70; by May 12 it traded at around $40.

It's hard for management to get in front of a worldwide recall when the company's culpability remains in question. But that's just what Bausch & Lomb needed to do, and didn't. Doing the right thing too slowly can be as damaging as doing nothing at all, particularly when it comes to consumer health products. It's peoples' eyes for goodness sake, get it off the shelves everywhere! The solve-the-mystery-later approach came a little too late.

In November of 2005, Bausch & Lomb had a share price of $82. Today it's at about $49. Yet the best the FDA could come up with in its most recent spanking of the company was to cite it for failure to report foreign infections -- the jury is still out on the actual cause.

Bausch & Lomb (BOL) says they will have to delay filing 2nd quarter results, and, by the way, pretax earnings will be a whopping 80% lower than projected in better days, before the global recall of lens solution, ReNu with MoistureLoc -- which can in some "unusual circumstances" (as characterized by the U.S. FDA) cause a type of eye infection.

Bausch & Lomb also had to say it will restate earnings for each year all the way back to 2001, following investigations into accounting practices of its Asian operations. (Here's an interesting case study to look over). Best to just dump all the bad news out there all at once, rather than dribble it out. Bausch & Lomb seems to be taking one enormous hit all at once, with the hope the company can start crawling back toward credibility, but it sure looks like one long hard crawl.

Michael Canfield is a private investor, a business and media writer, living in Seattle. He doesn't own stock in Baush & Lomb.