Investec hiked up its rating on microchip designer ARM Holdings (LON:ARM) ahead of the release of the company's first half results due out next week.
“We foresee no material surprises at the results and expect numbers to be in line” the broker said.
Investec expects revenues to be around the £230.4 mark with pre-tax profits of £127.8mln.
Of particular note, the broker says, will be the sales growth of the V8 microchip, used by Apple among others, as it carries higher royalty rates which will be key to hitting second half expectations.
It said the stock was “oversold” and added that the current share price provided “an attractive entry point into the stock.”
The broker bumped its ‘hold’ rating to a ‘buy’ and put a target price of 1,140p on it, some 115p higher than its current price.
Centrica (LON:CAN) is upgraded to ‘buy’ from ‘hold’ by HSBC, and the bank said the parent of British Gas offers ‘good returns’ for investors.
“Since the CMA report was published Centrica has announced a reduction in gas bills by 5%. With falling commodity prices we do not expect this to erode its retail margins,” HSBC said.
HSBC sees potential upside to its valuation, assuming British Gas can return to growth as a result of more competitive pricing. The bank also highlight the possibility of around £100mln of cost saving in Centrica’s upstream business, which would further improve margin.
Centrica has a ‘fair value’ of 300p, according to HSBC.
Elsewhere, Investec upgraded chipmaker ARM Holdings (LON:ARM) to ‘buy’ from ‘hold’.
Engineering firm GKN (LON:GKN) is no longer rated as ‘underperform’ by RBC Capital, which now has a ‘sector perform’ rating instead.
Investment firm Henderson (LON:HGG) rating was also picked up from the depths, with Jefferies International now seeing the share as a ‘hold’.
Canaccord Genuity, which has run the rule over several oil exploration and production firms, cut in half its valuation of Afren (LON:AFR) after news of the African firms latest corporate crisis; it is still seen as a ‘sell’ and the target is reduced to 1p per share from 2p.
The brokers targets were also lowered for Borders & Southern (LON:BOR) and Falkland Oil & Gas (LON:FOGL), while Kurdistan based Gulf Keystone (LON:GKP) and Genel (LON:GENL) were also moved down.
Pub group JD Wetherspoon (LON:JDW) was downgraded by Nomura, to ‘reduce’ from ‘neutral’, while the broker repeated a ‘buy’ for Mitchells & Butlers (LON:MAB) albeit the price target was lowered to 504p from 540p.