For Immediate Release
Chicago, IL - April 26, 2012 - Zacks.com announces the list of
stocks featured in the Analyst Blog. Every day the Zacks Equity
Research analysts discuss the latest news and events impacting
stocks and the financial markets. Stocks recently featured in the
blog include
St. Jude Medical Inc.
(
STJ
),
Abbott Laboratories
(
ABT
),
Medtronic
(
MDT
),
Boston Scientific
(
BSX
) and
Big Lots Inc
. (
BIG
).
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Here are highlights from Wednesday's Analyst
Blog:
St. Jude's Alliance with Abbott Labs
St. Jude Medical Inc.
(
STJ
) recently disclosed its decision to build on its mutual agreement
with
Abbott Laboratories
(
ABT
) by revealing the long-term Choice Alliance joint venture. This
initiative provides St. Jude Medical the opportunity to incorporate
Abbott's drug-eluting stents with its cardiovascular, cardiac
rhythm management and electrophysiology offerings.
Both companies have agreed to endorse each other's products to
their respective customers. Further, Abbott has received the rights
to promote St. Jude's RadiAnalyze Xpress Measurement System and the
ILUMIEN PCI Optimization System.
This alliance is expected to benefit patient outcomes, as
doctors will be able to combine Abbott's XIENCE family of stents
with St. Jude's optical coherence tomography (OCT) and fractional
flow reserve (
FFR
) know-how to widen the scope of clinical treatments.
Abbott Laboratories is a global manufacturer of a vast array of
health care products. Pharmaceuticals, medical and nutritional
offerings, including cardiovascular devices, are the core
franchises of the company. Within the vascular segment, the XIENCE
family of products (Xience V, PRIME and nano) was the worldwide
market leader of drug eluting stents in 2011.
St. Jude is consistently producing revenue growth and positive
earnings surprises over the past several quarters. We are impressed
by its solid fundamentals, healthy growth trajectory, strong
product mix, robust pipeline and cost management initiatives.
While a host of new growth drivers (including new products and
expansion in emerging markets) are expected to boost results in
2012 and beyond, we remain cautious about increased competition, a
still-soft CRM market and the dilutive impact of
acquisitions.
Th CRM space continues to thwart St. Jude as well as its peers
Medtronic
(
MDT
) and
Boston Scientific
(
BSX
). Our long-term Neutral recommendation on St. Jude is in agreement
with the short-term Zacks #3 Rank (Hold) retained by the stock.
Big Lots Lowers Outlook
The largest broad-line closeout retailer
Big Lots Inc
.'s (
BIG
) latest release reminds us of the Dow theory, which says the
market discounts everything. This stands perfectly true for the
company as its shares plunged more than 14% after management
lowered its first-quarter guidance on the key retail metric i.e.,
its comparable store sales.
Management now expects comparable store sales in the U.S. to be
somewhat negative compared to its earlier guidance of an increase
of 2% to 4%.
Big Lots experienced a sales decline in the month of April, with
electronics sales bringing in the biggest disappointment.
Management stated that the sales of furniture, hardlines and lawn
and garden were quite good.
Big Lots also updated its guidance on the recently acquired
Canadian operations. Management now expects retail sales to
be marginally higher than its earlier projection of $25 to $30
million of sales for the first quarter.
The company has been exploring numerous options to enter the
Canadian turf that ended with the acquisition of Liquidation World.
Liquidation World operates approximately 89 stores and offers a
broad assortment of closeout merchandise. Management believes the
acquisition will be accretive to its top line in the coming years,
and generate long-term growth prospects. The company also remains
focused on enhancing its store operations capacity.
Big Lots implemented a new retail inventory system to value
inventory based on the merchandise class level, instead of the
merchandise department level. This would help in getting a much
more clear view on the profitability of merchandising initiatives
undertaken. The company also hinted of focusing on new warehouse
management systems, HR systems and a real estate system in the next
two years.
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ABBOTT LABS (
ABT
): Free Stock Analysis Report
BIG LOTS INC (
BIG
): Free Stock Analysis Report
BOSTON SCIENTIF (
BSX
): Free Stock Analysis Report
MEDTRONIC (
MDT
): Free Stock Analysis Report
ST JUDE MEDICAL (STJ): Free Stock Analysis
Report
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