Posts for Ticker ‘CAT’

Transportation Companies Expect Huge Stimulus Windfall

New research indicates that transportation companies will benefit the most from the government’s huge stimulus investment in infrastructure. According to a new ChangeWave survey of 313 people who work for companies involved with infrastructure projects done between September 29 and October 5,  alternative energy will be that other sector that will do well because of federal investment in new products.

Fifty-six percent of those surveyed believe that
transportation infrastructure will see the largest benefit and 43% picked alternative energy projects. The poll also noted that water infrastructure has experienced the largest increase since the previous survey in March — jumping 10 points to 21%. Read More »

Posted on: November 17, 2009 – 5:59 am in Alternative Energy, Green Biz, Infrastructure, , , , ,

Media Digest 10/27/2009 Reuters, WSJ, NYTimes, FT, Bloomberg

newspaperReuters:   UBS (NYSE:UBS) will put in a new US chief.

Reuters:   Goldman Sachs (NYSE:GS) says “dark pools” help investors.

Reuters:   The US is welcoming the rise of the yuan.

Retuers:   Nelson Peltz’s board seat at Legg Mason (NYSE:LM) may not signal change. Read More »

Posted on: October 27, 2009 – 3:57 am in Press Digest, , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Media Digest (10/23/2009) Reuters, WSJ, NYTimes, FT, Bloomberg

newspaperReuters:   Japan Airlines faces $8.8 billion in excess debt if liquidated.

Reuters:   Amazon (NASDAQ:AMZN) beat Wall St. estimates.

Reuters:   GM’s CEO will get a pay raise.

Reuters:   Nokia (NYSE:NOK) sued Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) over patent infringement. Read More »

Posted on: October 23, 2009 – 3:57 am in Press Digest, , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Today’s Unusual Options Activity (ABX, CAT, EXPE, JAVA, CS)

These are today’s unusual options trading patterns seen late in the afternoon.  We have provided links over to VSInvestor.com for more details on each situation:

  • There have been two large options transactions in Barrick Gold Corporation (NYSE: ABX).
  • Caterpillar Inc. (NYSE: CAT) is seeing some longer-term bullish recovery bets that may have been profit taking on a prior trade.
  • Someone is making a big pre-earnings options trade in Expedia, Inc. (NASDAQ: EXPE).
  • Traders are placing bets both for and against a Sun Microsystems Inc. (NASDAQ: JAVA) buyout by Oracle Corp. (NASDAQ: ORCL) now that there are 3,000 more layoffs after the company keeps losing more and more money while the kids running the European Commission figure out that a money-losing company should not require a deep review of this sort for anti-competition.
  • OptionsHawk.com notified us of nine-times options volume in Credit Suisse Group (NYSE: CS).

You can join our open email distribution list to get updates on top analyst upgrades and downgrades, top day trader alerts, IPO’s, secondary offerings, Warren Buffett and other guru activity, M&A and more.

JON C. OGG
OCTOBER 21, 2009

Posted on: October 21, 2009 – 3:06 pm in Options, Trading Alert, , , , ,

Top Day Trader Alerts (AAPL, BPAX, CAT, FNM, FRE, MGM, NVAX)

These are this morning’s top day trader alerts.  We have more detailed price and volume data along with added color over with links through to each stock at VSInvestor.com:

Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL) is bumping against all-time highs after blowing out earnings.

BioSante Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (NASDAQ: BPAX) is one of this morning’s top gainers on safety reviews allowing the study to proceed.

Caterpillar Inc. (NYSE: CAT) is up at 52-week highs after blowing out earnings.

Fannie Mae (NYSE: FNM) and Freddie Mac (NYSE: FRE) are continuing yesterday’s losses, with Freddie being slapped harder than the Fannie step-sister.

MGM MIRAGE (NYSE: MGM) is up close to 10% on word that Kerkorian’s Tracinda is interested in exploring deals after the December City Center open.

Novavax, Inc. (NASDAQ: NVAX) is up 6% on a test of virus-like particle H1N1 influenza vaccine in Mexico with Avimex Laboratories and GE Healthcare.

You can join our open email distribution list to get updates on top analyst upgrades and downgrades, top day trader alerts, IPO’s, secondary offerings, Warren Buffett and other guru activity, M&A and more.

JON C. OGG

Posted on: October 20, 2009 – 8:58 am in After-Hours Activity, Pre-Market Activity, Trading Alert, , , , , , ,

Good News At Cat (CAT)

magazinCaterpillar (NYSE:CAT) beat most Wall St. expectations, and improved its guidance for the balance of 2009. The news pushed the stock up before the open of trading.

CAT said it had a  Q3 profit of $.64 per share, down $.75 per share from the third quarter of 2008. Revenue of $7.298 billion was down 44% from $12.981 billion in the third quarter of 2008. Read More »

Posted on: October 20, 2009 – 8:13 am in Earnings,

5 Wins in DJIA Component Earnings (CAT, KO, DD, PFE, UTX)

Bull and Bear ImageWe have seen the earnings reports from all five DJIA components which were on deck to report this Tuesday.  We are seeing a theme here: almost all posted lower earnings from a year ago that still beat earnings estimates, but this continues the trend that it is on cost cuts and/or on much lower revenues from a year ago.  The earnings came from Caterpillar Inc. (NYSE: CAT), The Coca Company (NYSE: KO), EI DuPont de Nemours & Co. (NYSE: DD), Pfizer Inc. (NYSE: PFE), and United Technologies (UTX).

We provided details on each, with guidance where appropriate, some added color, and how well these have each done in stock performance since the June 30 close of Q2 and since the March 9 close where traders use as the end of the bear market on the index closing bell basis.
Read More »

Posted on: October 20, 2009 – 8:07 am in Earnings, , , , ,

Media Digest (10/20/2009) Reuters, WSJ, NYTimes, FT, Bloomberg

newspaperReuters:   Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) beat earnings forecasts.

Reuters:   The IRS is probing some homebuyers’ tax credit gains.

Reuters:   The US is ready to bring more insider trading cases.

Reuters:   More US companies are cutting bonuses. Read More »

Posted on: October 20, 2009 – 4:02 am in Press Digest, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

5 DJIA Components Reporting Tuesday (CAT, DD, PFE, KO, UTX)

Bull and Bear ImageWe have provided some basic details on Tuesday’s earnings reports from DJIA components Caterpillar Inc. (NYSE: CAT), DuPont or EI DuPont de Nemours & Co. (NYSE: DD), Pfizer Inc. (NYSE: PFE), The Coca-Cola Company (NYSE: KO), and United Technologies Corp. (NYSE: UTX).

Included are the earningd estimates from Thomson Reuters.  Then we also gave some added color where applicable.  Lastly, we gave the performance of each stock since June 30 and then the recognized date of the close of March 9 that traders use for the day the bear market died.
Read More »

Posted on: October 19, 2009 – 4:04 pm in Calendar, Earnings, , , , ,

Cutting Cat in Half Never Looked So Good (CAT)

Caterpillar LogoCaterpillar Inc (NYSE: CAT) gave us some figures this morning showing that there is still some trouble in this economic recovery.  The maker of heavy industrial vehicles and equipment showed that dealer sales of its heavy equipment fell by a whopping 48% in August.  The largest drop was in the truck and bus segments and in its industrial segment.  The economy may be stabilizing, but an effective cut in half of these does not bode well for the thesis of a sudden return of large investments into cap-ex.  There is still some hope here that comparable sales figures will start to get easier after the next month or so.
Read More »

Posted on: September 21, 2009 – 1:56 pm in Infrastructure, Retail,

The 100 Most Valuable Brands Of 2009?

bearSeveral consulting firms post annual figures for the world’s most valuable brands. The two best known are probably the Interbrand and BrandZ surveys. They are notably different, up until now at least. BrandZ includes a number of large brands from Asia. Interbrand does not.

24/7 Wall St. has put together a list of the most valuable brands of 2009 by looking at valuation calculations from a number of sources. Then a base valuation was taken from the 2008 Interbrand data to fix values for this year and changes from last.

Most methods take into account the future earnings of a brand for its parent company. This is fundamentally a guess particularly during a turbulent period in the global economy. Interbrand’s rule is that a brand most get at least a third of its revenue from outside its country-of-origin. That is arbitrary, particularly as it apply to brands in China.

24/7 Wall St. has made the assumption that the value of most brands have been hurt log-term by the deep recession.  Forward earnings estimates for many of the firms on this list show that. Those brands which post value improvements show much more modest increases than they would be in a stable economy.

Looking at the Interbrand list from last year, it is fair to ask why firms like Nissan, Wal-Mart (WMT) and Red Bull are not present.

Because the brands on this list are taken from names on the Interbrand survey, we have not made a calculation about which companies may be new to their list in 2009 or which may drop off.

Public firms which are part of this ranking include (KO)(IBM)(MSFT)(GOOG)(GE)(NOK)(TM)(INTC)(MCD)(DIS)(HPQ)(AXP)(C)(HMC)(ORCL)(AAPL)(SNE)(PEP)(HBC)(NKE)(UPS)(FDX)(SAP)(DELL)(JPM)(GS)(KL)(EBAY)(SI)(F)(AIG)(AMZN)(CAT)(AVP)(RIMM)(GPS)(TIF)(BP)(SBUX)(JNJ)(MAR)(V)

The 100:  Read More »

Posted on: September 13, 2009 – 9:01 pm in Research, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Dow 14,000

bearThe media made a big deal of the fact that the DJIA rose above 9,000 for the first time in nearly eight months. The index was under 6,550 in early March, do the advance has been 38% since then, but the index is still well below 14,000 which it hit in October 2007. The Dow would have to rise 54% to get back to that point. That is an extraordinarily depressing figure given how far the market has already come and how hard it will be for it to rise to that number in what is still a harsh economic environment. Read More »

Posted on: July 24, 2009 – 3:56 am in Economy, , ,

At Least The Chinese Stimulus Works For The American Economy

china

Economists debate the impact of the U.S. economic stimulus plan, and if a second round of stimulus is needed. But there’s no doubt that China’s plan is working for us.

In the many rounds of second-quarter earnings calls, the CFOs of U.S. companies are lauding how well they are doing in China. Caterpillar Inc. (NYSE: CAT) topped Q2 expectations, saying that China’s fiscal stimulus is beginning to work for them. United Technologies Corp.(NYSE: UTX), expects strong second-half China results, as the economy there begins to recover. Read More »

Posted on: July 22, 2009 – 10:33 am in Autos, Banking, China, Economy, Oil & Gas, , , , , ,

Apple (APPL) And Caterpillar (CAT): Someone, Somewhere, Somehow, Is Spending Money

appleApple’s beat Wall St. consensus figures by posting earnings per share of $1.35 compared to Wall St. expectations of $1.17. The company also produced revenue of $8.33 billion, up 12% from last year. The recession must be over.

Apple’s figures are a conundrum. The firm sold 5.2 million iPhones in the quarter ending in June. A lot of people are using unemployment benefits to buy the handsets, or people who are supposed to be saving money and not spending it, according to the government, are running up the balances on their credit cards as if the economic downturn never happened. Read More »

Posted on: July 22, 2009 – 3:50 am in Banking, Consumer Electronics, Drug companies, Earnings, Editor's Picks, Food, Healthcare, PC Companies, Pharmaceuticals, Wireless, , , , ,

DJIA Component Earnings Trifecta (DD, MRK, UTX)

Money Stack ImageSo far we have three DJIA components with earnings out.  DuPont (NYSE: DD), Merck & Co. (NYSE: MRK), United Technologies (NYSE: UTX) have all posted earnings.  So far there are no train wrecks and technically these are above the Thomson Reuters consensus estimates as far as the earnings per share numbers numbers are concerned.  All details are below.
Read More »

Posted on: July 21, 2009 – 6:27 am in Earnings, , , , , ,

Earnings Previews for 11 of 30 DJIA Components This Week (CAT, DD, MRK, KO, PFE, BA, MMM, AXP, T, MCD, MSFT, MO)

This week will mark the first crest of earnings season as we have 11 of the 30 DJIA components reporting earnings this week alone.  On Tuesday, we have earnings from Caterpillar Inc. (NYSE: CAT), DuPont (NYSE: DD), Merck & Co., Inc. (NYSE: MRK), The Coca-Cola Company (NYSE: KO).  On Wednesday, we have Pfizer Inc. (NYSE: PFE) and Boeing Co. (NYSE: BA) on deck.  On Thursday, we have 3M Company (NYSE: MMM), AT&T, Inc. (NYSE: T), McDonald’s Corporation (NYSE: MCD) and Microsoft Corp. (NYSE: MSFT).  Altria Group, Inc. (NYSE: MO), a fairly recent DJIA-booted also reports Wednesday.  We have detailed earnings estimates and additional preview data below:
Read More »

Posted on: July 20, 2009 – 11:39 am in Earnings, , , , , , , , , , , ,

Shorts Flee Financials, Attack Industrials And Tech

bearShort sellers jumped out of major financial shares but piled into the stocks for major industrial firms based on data as of June 15. Shorts clearly think the restructuring of the bank industry has taken hold permanently, but that the manufacturing industry is still likely to be troubled.

The short interest in Citigroup (C) dropped 3% to 1.244 billion. Shares sold short in Bank of America (BAC) dropped 20% to 95.5 billion. The short interest in AIG (AIG) fell 4% to 228.7 million shares. Read More »

Posted on: June 25, 2009 – 3:38 am in Short Interest, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Unusual Dividend Tracking (CAT, CLX, MSFT, TGT, TSCM, VMC, ACAS, IAF)

Money Stack ImageDividends in general are used as the historic underlying measurement of companies and their abilities to stay profitable at current levels.  Today and last night we have seen some rather unusual dividend news or “in addition to the dividend news” from the likes of Caterpillar Inc. (NYSE: CAT), Clorox Co. (NYSE: CLX), Microsoft Corp. (NASDAQ: MSFT), Target Corp. (NYSE: TGT), TheStreet.com, Inc. (NASDAQ: TSCM), and Vulcan Materials Co. (NYSE: VMC).  American Capital Ltd. (NASDAQ: ACAS) takes the cake for unusual dividends, and the payout at the Australia Equity Fund Inc. (AMEX: IAF) closed-end fund also borders one the unusual.

Read More »

Posted on: June 11, 2009 – 11:08 am in Dividend, Shareholder Issues, Value Investing, , , , , , , ,

Top Analyst Upgrades & Downgrades (ADSK, AVY, CAT, DFS, FEIC, BEN, JWN, PMTC, SLB, VECO)

These are some of the top pre-market analyst calls with upgrades and downgrades from Wall Street firms this Thursday morning with more than two hours until the market opens:

AutoDesk  (ADSK) Started as Neutral at Janney Montgomery Scott.
Avery Dennison (AVY) Started as Underperform at Baird.
Caterpillar (CAT) Cut to Sell at UBS.
Discover Financial (DFS) Started as Outperform at FBR.
FEI Co. (FEIC) Started as Buy at Stifel Nicolaus.
Franklin Resources (BEN) Started as Outperform at Wachovia.
Nordstrom (JWN) Cut to Neutral at Credit Suisse.
Parametric Technology (PMTC) Started as Buy at Janney Montgomery Scott.
Schlumberger (SLB) Started as Neutral at HSBC.
Veeco Instruments (VECO) Started as Buy at Stifel Nicolaus.

JON C. OGG

Posted on: May 28, 2009 – 6:35 am in Analyst Calls, , , , , , , , , ,

Top Analyst Upgrades (ANDE, CAT, CELG, CLX, DNDN)

money-stack-image45It is actually looking pretty thin out there in the land of analyst upgrades.  These are the few upgrades and positive research calls we have seen from Wall Street this Wednesday morning with about two hours until the market open:

Andersons (ANDE) Raised to Buy at Piper Jaffray.
Caterpillar (CAT) Raised to Overweight at JPMorgan.
Celgene (CELG) Raised to Outperform at Bernstein.
Clorox (CLX) Started as Outperform at RBC.
Dendreon (DNDN) Raised to Buy at Merriman Curhan Ford.

JON C. OGG

Posted on: April 22, 2009 – 6:51 am in Analyst Calls, , , , ,