24/7 Wall St. » LAB

LaBranche Exits DMM/Specialist Ops (LAB, NYX, BCS)

247wallst — Wed, 13 Jan 2010 21:46:21 +0000

LaBranche & Co. Inc. (NYSE: LAB) has been rumored to be making a serious change or sale for some time. Tonight, that was partially confirmed. The company has signed a sale agreement to sell its specialist operations, now called its Designated Market Maker business, to Barclays plc’s (NYSE: BCS) Barclays Capital for some $25 million. It is also purchasing all of LaBranche’s net DMM positions as of the closing date. This is not a 100% exit from all market making operations, just to be clear.

The company said in its release that it will continue its market-making in ETFs, equity options, FX options and futures, both domestically and internationally. The company noted that these have been the majority of market making revenues since 2007.

This is not a total business sale. LaBranche will retain all the cash and its non-DMM assets including its shares in NYSE Euronext (NYSE: NYX). The company also noted that it will no longer have the 76 million net capital requirement tied to market making operations.

As part of the issue, it is redeeming its remaining 11% senior notes due in 2012 in the aggregate principal amount of $189.3 million. The redemption is at the current redemption price of 102.75% plus accrued and unpaid interest. Upon completion of the redemption, the indenture will be terminated and the Company will have no outstanding public debt, resulting in a reduction of the Company’s interest expense by about $21 million per year.

LaBranche is going to further increase its current share repurchase authorization from the about $23.4 million remaining to $100 million. This will dispose of the remaining intangible assets and it will take a $69.7 million non-cash GAAP charge.

The floor operations at NYSE and elsewhere have changed steadily in the last decade. That appears to be continuing today.

JON C. OGG

Posted in Banking, Brokerage Firms, Exchange News, Financial Stocks, Mergers and Buy Outs Tagged: BCS, LAB, NYX

Top Analyst Downgrades (AVP, CAH, ETR, ETFC, F, IP, ITRI, LAB, NDAQ, NYX, SNDK, WYN)

247wallst — Mon, 02 Feb 2009 12:45:14 +0000

These are some of the top pre-market analyst downgrades and negative calls we have seen on Wall Street this morning:

Avon Products (AVP) Cut to Neutral at Goldman Sachs.
Cardinal Health (CAH) Cut to Neutral at Goldman Sachs.
Entergy (ETR) Cut to Hold at Jefferies.
E*TRADE (ETFC) Cut to Equal Weight at Barclays.
Ford (F) Cut to Underweight at Barclays.
International Paper (IP) Cut to Sell at Goldman Sachs.
Itron (ITRI) Cut to Neutral at UBS.
LaBranche (LAB) Cut to Neutral at Goldman Sachs.
NASDAQ: OMX (NDAQ) Cut to Neutral at Goldman Sachs.
NYSE (NYX) Cut to Sell at Goldman Sachs; Cut to Market Perform at KBW.
SanDisk (SNDK) Cut to Sell at Auriga.
Wyndam Worldwide (WYN) Cut to Neutral at Goldman Sachs.

Jon C. Ogg
February 2, 2009

Posted in Analyst Calls Tagged: AVP, CAH, ETFC, ETR, F, IP, ITRI, LAB, NDAQ, NYX, SNDK, WYN

Early Bird Analyst Upgrades (AUO, CLB, LAB, SKM, SOHU)

247wallst — Wed, 14 Jan 2009 07:33:53 +0000

These are some of the early bird upgrades and positive research calls we have seen from Wall Street analysts this Wednesday morning with more than two hours to the open:

AU Optronics (NYSE: AUO) Raised to Overweight at HSBC.
Core Labs (NYSE: CLB) Raised to Outperform at JPMorgan.
LaBranche (NYSE: LAB) Raised to Buy from Sell at Goldman Sachs.
SK Telecom (NYSE: SKM) Raised to Buy at Citigroup.
Sohu.com (NASDAQ: SOHU) Started as Outperform at Oppenheimer.

Jon C. Ogg
January 14, 2009

Posted in Analyst Calls Tagged: AUO, CLB, LAB, SKM, SOHU

Goldman Sachs Lowers Financial Estimates (AB, ABLk, BLK, CLMS, CME, BEN, GBL, IVZ, JNS, NITE, LAB, LM, MKTX, NYX, TROW, PZN, NDAQ, TRAD)

247wallst — Thu, 10 Jan 2008 09:22:38 +0000

Goldman Sachs has lowered estimates on many financial services players this morning:

AllianceBernstein (AB) (buy);
AMBAC Financial (ABK) (neutral);
Blackrock (BLK) (buy);
Calamos Asset Mgmt. (CLMS) (neutral);
CME Group (CME) (buy);
Franklin Resources (BEN) (neutral);
Gamco Investors (GBL) (sell);
INVESCO plc (IVZ) (neutral);
Janus Capital (JNS) (neutral);
Knight Trading (NITE) (buy);
Labranche (LAB) (sell);
Legg Mason (LM) (neutral);
Marketaccess Holdings (MKTX) (neutral);
NYSE Euronext (NYX) (neutral);
T. Rowe Price (TROW) (neutral);
Pzena Investment Mgmt. (PZN) (neutral);
The NASDAQ Stock Market (NDAQ) (neutral);
TradeStation (TRAD) (neutral)

Jon C. Ogg
January 10, 2008

Largest Van der Moolen Specialist Stocks II (VDM, LAB, HUM, MBI, IP, MT, PFE, PHM, SAP, HOT, SYK, TXT, UA, WEN)

247wallst — Thu, 15 Nov 2007 09:47:52 +0000

We have already noted the Van der Moolen (NYSE:VDM) exit of all NYSE Specialist activities and we’ve already covered some of the other key stocks where Van der Moolen acts as a Specialist in the underlying stocks. What we wanted to look at is the underling stocks companies where Van der Moolen acts as a specialist to the companies. The huge list can be found at http://www.vdm-usa.com/clients/alpha.asp off their web site.

Please be advised that these may have changed because we’ve already seen two merger stocks on the full list that are no longer traded. This was taken from Van der Moolen’s site, so any errors there probably means they already laid off the I.T. editor for its web site.

Here are some of the key names for a second list: Humana Inc. (HUM), International Paper Co. (IP), MBIA Inc. (MBI), Mittal Steel Co. (MT), Pfizer Inc. (PFE), Pulte Homes Inc. (PHM), SAP A.G. (SAP), Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide Inc. (HOT), Stryker Corp. (SYK), Textron Inc. (TXT), Under Armour, Inc. (UA), Wendy’s International Inc. (WEN)…. Also listed is LaBranche & Co. Inc. (LAB), which is a bit ironic seeing as that this is another specialist firm.

Jon C. Ogg
November 15, 2007

Jon Ogg produces the 24/7 Wall St. Special Situation Investing Newsletter; he does not own securities in the companies he covers.

The 52-Week Low Club

247wallst — Wed, 12 Sep 2007 15:12:08 +0000

Labranche (LAB) Being a specialist firm trading stocks has gotten to be nasty business. Shares drop to $4.65 from 52-week high of $12.21.

King Pharmaceuticals (KG) Still taking hammer because patent on top drug was found to be invalid. Down to $12.26 from 52-week high of $22.25.

International Rectifier (IRF) CEO on leave due to audit. Shares just keep falling. Drops to $31.37 from 52-week high of $44.36.

Expressjet Holdings (XJT) Oil up. Bad time to be in airline business. Falls to $3.68 from 52-week high of $9.61.

Steven Madden (SHOO) Director steps down. Shares now off to $20.02 from 52-week high of $44.70.

Home Solutions (HSOA) Provider of construction business during real estate recession. Shares off to $2.45 from 52-week high of $8.24.

Caribou Coffee (CBOU) Like Starbucks (SBUX), only smaller. But, similar drop in stock price. Down to $5.74 from 52-week high of $9.27.

Douglas A. McIntyre