Needham & Company Reiterates a 'Buy' on Applied Materials (AMAT); Silicon Cyclical Recovery and Accelerated Benefit of Varian Acquisition

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AMAT Hot Sheet

Rating Summary:
6 Buy, 6 Hold, 2 Sell

Rating Trend:

Up

Today's Overall Ratings:
Up: 20 | Down: 11 | New: 38

Needham & Company reiterates a 'Buy' on Applied Materials (NASDAQ: AMAT) price target raised $2 to $16.

Analyst, Y. Edwin Mok, said, "AMAT reported better than expected F1Q12 (Jan) results and guided for higher revenue despite persisting weakness in Display and Solar. The results were led by stronger than expected Silicon orders/revenue, particularly strong uptick coming from the Varian acquisition. With the semicap cycle past the bottom, management is optimistic for continued revenue growth driven by aggressive investments by the foundries. We believe longer-term investors should buy the stock on the cyclical recovery in Silicon, AMAT’s strengthened position after completing the Varian acquisition, and the potential upside should Display recover in C2H12."

"We raise our FY12E non-GAAP EPS to $1.05 and FY13E to $1.25, and raise our PT from $14 to $16, or a 12X our CY13 non-GAAP EPS of $1.30."

For an analyst ratings summary and ratings history on Applied Materials click here. For more ratings news on Applied Materials click here.

Shares of Applied Materials closed at $13.21 yesterday, with a 52 week range of $9.70-$16.93.

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