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Apple Stock Gets Price-Target Cut On Longer iPhone Upgrade Cycle

Apple ( AAPL ) stock dipped Wednesday following a price-target cut by investment bank UBS. Apple shares were down a fraction, near 93, in midday trading on the stock market today . UBS analyst Steven Milunovich reiterated his buy rating on Apple stock but lowered his 12-month price target to 115 from 120. Milunovich also reduced his sales and earnings estimates for fiscal years 2016 and 2017 based on a more cautious view of iPhone growth. Apple’s fiscal 2016 ends Sept. 24. “Our installed base analysis reflects that the iPhone 6 was unusually well received, as perhaps 37% of the installed base entering fiscal 2015 purchased a new iPhone,” Milunovich said in a research report. “The ramification is being felt in fiscal 2016 with a much lower 25% upgrade rate expected. “Our base case for fiscal 2017 is total iPhone unit growth of 4% to 217 million based on a 23% upgrade rate and a decline in new customers.” Milunovich said his base case assumes that iPhone owners upgrade their handsets every 2.5 years. On Tuesday, Drexel Hamilton analyst Brian White said “ gloom and doom ” sentiment around Apple stock had reached “extreme” levels. He reiterated his buy rating on Apple stock, with a price target of 185. RELATED: When Tim Cook Gives A TV Interview, Apple Investors Should Beware

Canadian Solar Beats Q1 Views; Yingli Ducks SunEd Bankruptcy Path

Canadian Solar ( CSIQ ) stock rocketed Wednesday on an across-the-board Q1 beat, as fellow solar panel-maker Yingli Green Energy Holding ( YGE ) announced it can’t repay 1.7 billion yuan ($263 million) in loans due Thursday. Yingli also reported fiscal Q4 sales and module shipments that missed Wall Street views, but better-than-expected losses. Canadian Solar stock, which touched an eight-month low Tuesday, was up 13% in morning trading Wednesday, near 17.50. Yingli stock, which has traded below 5 all year, was up a fraction in morning trading on the stock market today . IBD’s 20-company Energy-Solar industry group, which hit a three-year low Tuesday, was up 2.5% on Canadian Solar’s Q1 beat. And Chinese solar manufacturers JinkoSolar ( JKS ), Trina Solar ( TSL ) and JA Solar ( JASO ) were up 5%, 4% and 2.5%, respectively, on Yingli’s report. For Q1, Canadian Solar reported $721.4 million in sales and 39 cents earnings per share ex items, down a respective 16% and 62.5% vs. the year-earlier quarter, the fourth straight quarter of declines for both metrics. Still, both measures topped the consensus of 10 analysts polled by Thomson Reuters for $663.7 million and 14 cents. Canadian Solar reported 1.198 gigawatts in module shipments, down 3%, but beating its own views for 1.085 GW to 1.135 GW. Current-quarter guidance for $710 million to $760 million would be up 15% at the midpoint and beats the consensus for $702.4 million. Module shipments were guided up 44% vs. the year-earlier quarter to 1.2 GW to 1.25 GW. Yingli Debts Under Negotiation Yingli said early Wednesday it’s negotiating with creditors to restructure its medium-term loans which mature Thursday. The company is also “negotiating privately with potential strategic investors” and considering selling assets to improve its debt-to-equity ratio. Potential asset sales include land-use rights for which subsidiary Hainan Yingli received 265 million yuan ($40.8 million) in 2015 and expects the balance of 470 million yuan $72.3 million) this year. The company has reported year-over-year quarterly losses since December 2011. Its loan negotiations follow a month after giant U.S. solar developer SunEdison filed for bankruptcy after technically defaulting — unless extensions were granted — on $725 million in second-lien loans. For its fiscal Q4 ended Dec. 31, Yingli reported $325.7 million in sales and a 71-cent per-share loss ex items. Sales fell 41% year over year, but losses shrank from a $4.90 per-share loss in the year-earlier quarter. The consensus modeled $372.3 million and a $1.48 per-share loss ex items. Yingli wrapped up fiscal 2015 with $1.54 billion in sales, down 26%, and a $1.98 per-share loss minus items vs. $12.10 in year-ago losses. Analysts expected $1.63 billion and a $31.30 per-share loss. On a year-over-year basis, module shipments for fiscal Q4 and the year fell 51% and 27%, respectively, to 460.4 megawatts and 2.45 GW. For the current quarter, Yingli guided to 480 MW to 510 MW in module shipments, down 34% at the midpoint. Wall Street view $414.4 million in fiscal Q1 sales, down 12%, and a $1.11 per-share loss ex items, shrinking from $3.60 in the year-earlier quarter.

Gigamon Talks Up Security, Amazon Public Cloud At Analyst Day

Gigamon ( GIMO ) expects its push into security products to gain traction as corporate spending shifts from prevention to detection and containment. Management delivered that message at the company’s analyst day on Tuesday, during which Gigamon also highlighted plans to support public clouds, starting with Amazon Web Services, part of e-commerce giant Amazon.com ( AMZN ). Amazon stock hit an all-time high on Tuesday and has been on a roll since the company posted its Q1 earnings beat on April 28. The IBD Leaderboard stock, however, is extended from both its 603.34 entry and its 638.11 alternative entry, trading Wednesday morning near 708, up a fraction. “In conjunction with its investor day, Gigamon announced field trials for a network visibility product that will work in cloud environments, particularly with Amazon Web Services,” Mark Kelleher, an analyst at D.A. Davidson, said in a research report. “This new product will provide tools vendors with information on data flows, between customer devices within a public cloud, private cloud or hybrid cloud environment. “While initially targeted at the AWS environment, GIMO expects to expand to other public cloud environments, such as Microsoft ( MSFT ) Azure and Alphabet ’s ( GOOGL ) Google. Meaningful revenue from this new offering is not expected until 2017.” Gigamon stock, however, was down 2% in early trading in the stock market today , near 30. Gigamon shares broke out March 11 at a 29.62 buy point, and so they remain within buy range. Gigamon’s roots are in selling communications network hardware appliances that analyze and manage data traffic, but it’s been expanding into security. “Management believes breaches are inevitable, and thus dollars will shift from prevention to detection/prediction/containment — which is where Gigamon plays,” Jason Ader, a William Blair analyst, said in a report. “The network is the most content-rich source of information for all kinds of security tools as the network touches everything, including users, devices, and applications. “But historically, the network was used mainly for connectivity. GigaSecure can look at all traffic and extract the right information and feed it to the right security and analytics tools.” Gigamon stock is up about 13% in 2016 so far. It reported Q1 earnings and revenue that topped estimates, and its shares touched a two-year high at 35 on April 29. Gigamon has an IBD Composite Rating of 95 out of a possible 99, putting it among the top 5% of all stocks in key metrics such as earnings and revenue growth.