Friday, July 11, 2008

Solar: Citi Cuts Applied Materials' Rating To Hold, Sees Samsung Cutbacks (AMAT)

AMAT is one of the class acts in solar. Unfortunately (for today anyway) they are also in chip equipment. From Barron's Tech Trader Daily:

Applied Materials (AMAT) shares are trading off sharply this morning after Citigroup’s Timothy Arcuri cut his his rating on the stock to Hold from Buy. He also cut estimates on KLA-Tencor (KLAC), Novellus (NVLS), Lam Research (LRCX) and Advanced Energy Industries (AEIS).

Arcuri reports in a research note that he sees AMAT’s Q3 semi equipment orders tracking down 5%-10% in sequentially off a Q2 that was at the low-end of guidance due to push-outs from Hynix that now also includes Samsung and Taiwan Semiconductor (TSM)....MORE