We are downgrading Apollo Group (APOL), ITT Educational Services (ESI) and Lincoln Educations Services (LINC) to Neutral from Outperform mostly due to rising concerns that a more-challenging legal/regulatory environment could hinder longer-term growth and hold back valuation multiples near-term. …… We…
I’ve been wondering if hard economic times would cause people to commit more crimes. The Wall Street Journal wrote an interesting article about this last Wednesday: “Evidence Suggests That People Don’t Suddenly Commit Murder After Losing Their Jobs; But Theft,…
We never believed the investment of taxpayer funds was intended to be permanent. We view it as our duty to return the funds. – Goldman CFO David Viniar on a conference call this morning Paying back TARP (Troubled Asset Relief…
Wow, the bulls are really feeling good. “Wells Fargo Carries The Day” and the S&P and Dow closed at 2 months high and the Nasdaq is near its highs for the year. On Mad Money this evening, Cramer went so…
Wells Fargo (WFC) this morning pre-announced a record 1st quarter saying it expects 55 cents in net income – compared to 23 cents expected by analysts. Net interest margins at 4.1%, Wachovia acquisition going great, etc… Really? Wells Fargo stock…
Family Dollar (FDO), a discount retailer, reported another superb quarter this morning. Same store sales were up 6.4% and net income up 33%. They increased their fiscal 2009 EPS forecast from $1.63-$1.81 (1/7/09) to $1.90-$2.00. Clearly their business is on…
The impact of excessive risk, while already seen, still has more to go in our opinion, especially given a rolling recession by asset class. While mortgage losses may be half way to the peak, card and consumer losses may only…
The question of bad debt expense for all these guys is now introduced. – Ariel Sokol, Analyst, Wedbush Morgan Apollo Group (APOL), owner of The University of Phoenix, is getting clobbered today after reporting fiscal year 2nd quarter earnings after…
That’s when the market took off – [S&P] futures went from 814 to 822. When they think the consumer is completely dead, and Best Buy blows out earnings, even if a lot of it is lowered prices on things, the…
Federal Express (FDX) this morning announced fiscal year 3rd quarter earnings and what really stood out for me was a massive margin squeeze. Despite a 44% drop in fuel expenses from $980 million to $551 million in their core Express…