Month: August 2011

We are retaining our Underperform recommendation on PMI Group Inc. ( PMI ) as the company continues to rep ort losses. PM I Group’s second-quarter operating loss was worse than the Zacks Consensus Estimate and widened year over year as the company continued to suffer mortgage losses. […]

Recently, Allos Therapeutics Inc. ( ALTH ) announced the commencement of a late-stage registrational study (n=549: PDX-017) to evaluate its drug Folotyn in patients with previously undiagnosed peripheral T-cell lymphoma (PTCL). […]

A funny thing happened on the way to tech giant Hewlett-Packard’s ( HPQ ) fiscal 3rd quarter 2011 earnings report, which was supposed to have come out after the closing bell Thursday. When reports leaked that H-P was planning to spin-off its PC business and was seeking to purchase British-based software firm Autonomy for $10 billion, this forced the company to report earlier than expected. Confirmed by Hewlett-Packard was that it is indeed spinning off its entire PC business — on both the Consumer and Enterprise sides […]

The rating outlook of SLM Corp. ( SLM ), commonly known as Sallie Mae, has been raised to "stable" from "negative" by Moody's Investors Services, a unit of Moody’s Corp. […]

Principal Financial Group, Inc. ( PFG ) announced that its board of directors has authorized a buyback of $200 million of common stock. The new authorization is part of the company’s strategy to deploy up to $400 million of capital for acquisitions or share buybacks in the second half of 2011, taking its full year 2011 capital reserved for these purposes to $1 billion. […]

Yesterday, the board of Marsh & McLennan Companies Inc. ( MMC ) announced the authorization and approval of its stock repurchase program of $500 million, thereby expanding it to $1.0 billion. However, no time limit has been decided for execution of the plan […]

Lobbying expenses declined for most health insurance companies, such as Humana Inc. ( HUM ) and Aetna Inc. […]

Mylan Inc. ( MYL ) recently announced that Endo Pharmaceuticals ( ENDP ) filed a patent infringement lawsuit in connection with an abbreviated new drug application (ANDA) filed by Mylan with the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for the generic version of Endo’s acute migraine drug Frova. Mylan believes it is the first company to file an ANDA for generic Frova and is expecting to be granted 180 days of marketing exclusivity once approved. […]

Recently, we reaffirmed our Neutral recommendation on Life Technologies ( LIFE ) with a target price of $41.00. Life Technologies reported an EPS of 89 cents in the second quarter of fiscal 2011, missing the Zacks Consensus Estimate by 5 cents and 2 cents lower than the year-ago quarter. Revenues increased 4% year over year to $945 million, missing the Zacks Consensus Estimate of $961 million […]