Nty Posts -- BloggingStocks

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Analyst upgrades, downgrades and initiations: BT, NVS, NOK, TXI, MTB ...

Analyst upgrades:

Canaccord upgraded Imperial Oil (NYSE: IMO) to Buy from Speculative Buy following an increase in crude oil forecast.
BT Group (NYSE: BT) was upgraded to Outperform from Market Perform at Bernstein.
Novartis (NYSE: NVS) was upgraded to Overweight from Neutral at JP Morgan.
CommVault (NASDAQ: CVLT) was upgraded to Neutral from Sell at Goldman.
AvalonBay (NYSE: AVB) was upgraded to Buy from Hold at Sandler O'Neill.

Analyst upgrades:

Keefe Bruyette upgraded shares of Colonial Bancgroup (NYSE: CNB) to Outperform from Market Perform on valuation following the recent weakness and believes the company will be eligible to receive TARP funds. Morgan Stanley believes the company's valuation adequately reflects risk to the loan portfolio; the firm raised shares to Equal Weight from Underweight.
Merrill upgraded Ericsson (NASDAQ: ERIC) and ASML Holding (NASDAQ: ASML) to Buy from Underperform and believes their valuation reflects the worst-case for bad news.
Oppenheimer upgraded Trimble Navigation to Outperform from Perform on valuation as they believe the company's long-term growth story is intact.
Celestica (NYSE: CLS) was upgraded to Sector Outperformer from Sector Performer at CIBC.
KeyCorp (NYSE: KEY) was added to Goldman's Conviction Buy List.
Wachovia raised EastGroup Properties (NYSE: EGP) to Outperform from Market Perform.

Analyst downgrades:

UBS cut Barclays (NYSE: BCS) to Neutral from Buy as they believe capital raises could negatively impact earnings and that the dividend is likely to be cut.
JP Morgan downgraded Discovery Holdings (NASDAQ: DISCA) to Underweight from Neutral based on valuation and the deteriorating economic outlook.
Friedman Billings downgraded shares of Janus Capital (NYSE: JNS) to Underperform from Market Perform and lowered its target to $7 from $23 as they see further risk to the downside following the company's weaker-than-expected results.
LKQ Corp (NASDAQ: LKQX) was cut to Sector Perform from Outperform at RBC Capital.
Affymetrix (NASDAQ: AFFX) was lowered to Sell from Hold at Deutsche Bank.
RightNow Tech (NASDAQ: RNOW) was downgraded at Baird to Neutral from Outperform.

MOST NOTEWORTHY: Mattel (MAT), UnitedHealth (UNH), Alcoa (AA), 1-800-Flowers.com (FLWS) and Marathon Oil (MRO) were today's noteworthy upgrades:

Piper upgraded shares of Mattel (NYSE: MAT) to Outperform from Peer Perform on valuation and improving fundamentals and notes that product recalls have historically not had a lasting impact on sales.

Goldman upgraded UnitedHealth (NYSE: UNH) to Neutral from Sell on valuation and expectations for improved profitability in 2H07.

Alcoa (NYSE: AA) was upgraded to Outperform from Market Perform at Friedman Billings on valuation and expectations for a favorable report next week.

JMP Securities has increased confidence in 1-800-Flowers.com's (NASDAQ: FLWS) management initiatives to drive leverage and operating margins following the Q4 report, upgrading shares to Outperform from Market Perform.

Lehman upgraded shares of Marathon Oil (NYSE: MRO) to Overweight from Equal-Weight on valuation and expectations for strong oil and gas production growth...

OTHER UPGRADES:

Goldman upgraded the oil services sector to Attractive from Neutral based on the recent pullback; Sunoco (NYSE: SUN) and Hess (NYSE: HES) were also upgraded to Buy from Neutral.

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

#	Blogger	Posts
1	Joseph Lazzaro	114
2	Tom Johansmeyer	99
3	Steven Mallas	51
4	Connie Madon	48
5	Tom Taulli	47
6	Mark Fightmaster	37
7	Steven Halpern	35
8	Trey Thoelcke	34
9	Paul Foster	25
10	Brian White	24
11	Brent Archer	22
12	Jon Ogg	22
13	Zac Bissonnette	21
14	Melly Alazraki	21
15	Jim Cramer	21
16	Eric Buscemi	17
17	Michael Fowlkes	14
18	Michael Shulman	13
19	Elizabeth Harrow	11
20	Sheldon Liber	9

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