24/7 Wall St.

Now that we are mostly through earnings season and now that stocks have challenged all-time highs recently, investors and traders alike have to start thinking about how to position themselves for 2014. Which are the stocks to buy, which are the stocks to sell and which stocks should simply be avoided? 24/7 Wall St. reviews many Wall Street analyst research notes each trading day looking for new ideas for our readers. These are this Monday’s top analyst upgrades, downgrades and initiations seen from Wall Street research firms.

Twitter Inc. (NYSE: TWTR) was given a formal Neutral rating at Sterne Agee. The firm said:

Our valuation work suggests in the base case Twitter shares should be worth at least $25 to $32 in the next 12 to 24 months. In the upside case, shares should be worth $33 to $48 while in the downside case, shares should be worth $13 to $15 during the same period.

AGCO Corp. (NYSE: AGCO) was downgraded to Sell from Neutral with a $53 price target (versus a $58.03 close) at Goldman Sachs.

Best Buy Co. (NYSE: BBY) was reiterated as Buy at Jefferies, but the price target was raised up to $52 from $44 (versus a $42.41 close) based on more profitable use of the retail floor space.

Burlington Stores Inc. (NYSE: BURL) was started as Buy at Bank of America Merrill Lynch, started as Equal Weight at Morgan Stanley, started as Buy at SunTrust Robinson Humphrey and started as Overweight at J.P. Morgan.

Concho Resources Inc. (NYSE: CXO) was raised to Buy from Hold and the price target was raised to $130 from $101 (versus a $110.20 close) at Canaccord Genuity.

Eli Lilly & Co. (NYSE: LLY) was downgraded to Sell from Neutral with a $48 price target (versus a $50.63 close) at Goldman Sachs.

Empire State Realty Trust (NYSE: ESRT) was started as Buy at Bank of America Merrill Lynch and started as Hold at Stifel Nicolaus.

Exxon Mobil Corp. (NYSE: XOM) was raised to Buy from Hold and given a $104 price target (versus a $92.73 close) at Argus. The firm called the third quarter the low and believes its strong finances and margins are attractive.

ImmunoGen Inc. (NASDAQ: IMGN) was downgraded to Underweight from Equal Weight at Morgan Stanley.

Jarden Corp. (NYSE: JAH) was started as Outperform with a $62 price target (versus a $54.28 close) at Credit Suisse.

KLA-Tencor Corp. (NASDAQ: KLAC) was downgraded to Negative from Neutral at Susquehanna.

Lam Research Corp. (NASDAQ: LRCX) was downgraded to Neutral from Positive at Susquehanna.

Prothena Corp. PLC (NASDAQ: PRTA) was started as Outperform with a $32 price target (versus $24.90 close) at Credit Suisse.

Teekay Offshore Partners L.P. (NYSE: TOO) was downgraded to Neutral from Buy at Bank of America Merrill Lynch.

UBS issued a list of large cap tech stocks to buy and also the ones to avoid.

Cowen & Co. has an interesting take on gold deals ahead, naming small cap gold stocks that should be acquired by the large producers.