An analyst likes Nokia Corporation (NYSE: NOK) despite every misstep and problem caused by better more well-heeled smartphone makers. Credit Suisse is out with an upgrade this morning that took that rating to Outperform and that is all the way up from Underperform. The firm is raising its handset estimates by 3% for 2011 and by 2% for 2012. The firm expects that the overall handset market will be around 1.82 billion units in 2011 and 1.85 billion units in 2012. That would be growth of 12% and 2% respectively. Cited for why is the continued strength in baseband volumes seen by Asian vendors. The note also maintains that 80% of sales in 2015 will be smartphone sales.
At the same time, Credit Suisse has downgraded shares of LM Ericsson Telephone Co. (NASDAQ: ERIC) to Neutral. Nokia shares are indicated up 2.5% at $5.21 in the New York pre-market trading versus a 52-week range of $4.46 to $11.75. No major price change has been seen in Ericsson in pre-market trading as of yet.
JON C. OGG
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