• HSBC downgraded Eli Lilly & Co. (NYSE:LLY) to Neutral from Overweight.
• Following the loss of the Army Linguist contract, Credit Suisse downgraded L-3 Communications Hldgs Inc. (NYSE:LLL) to Neutral from Outperform with an $83 target.

• Cooper Companies Inc. (NYSE:COO) was downgraded to Underweight from Neutral, with a $42 target at Prudential; they believe another reduction in 2007 guidance is likely and, additionally, the company is likely to lose additional market share in the Toric market.
• Credit Suisse, seeing potential risk to production targets at Murphy Oil Corp. (NYSE:MUR), downgraded the company to Underperform from Neutral.
• RBC Capital Markets downgraded Sovereign Bancorp Inc. (NYSE:SOV) to Underperform from Sector Perform based on valuation.

Analyst downgrades 12-18-06: Eli Lilly downgraded to Neutral originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Mon, 18 Dec 2006 11:05:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.