-- adds Constellation Health --
After another somewhat hectic week for the miners, with Glencore remaining a key point of attention, it is perhaps little surprise that the sectors analysts have been running the numbers.
Friday brings sector notes from both Goldman Sachs and UBS.
The former headlines with a question; has the risk versus reward in the sector change enough to justify the rally?
“We believe the main argument for buying miners at these levels has to be higher commodity prices,” says Goldman analyst Eugene King, as he highlights a 15% rally this past week.
He adds: “But any argument for higher prices has to start with growing demand from China, in our view, which given the so far successful attempts to rebalance its economy, we don’t expect.”
King, with his current 12 month price targets, sees between 14-32% downside for the ‘big four’ – which are Rio Tinto (LON:RIO), BHP Billiton (LON:BLT), Glencore (LON:GLEN) and Anglo American (LON:AAL).
And this morning, the analyst downgrades Kaz Minerals (LON:KAZ) to ‘sell’ from ‘hold’ following a 40% price surge in the past few days, He says the copper price has been relatively stable, there’s been no news, and the rise in value was not warranted.
UBS has materially downgraded its view on base metal prices.
“We are overall cautious on the medium-term outlook for industrial commodities due to slowing demand growth in China,” said UBS. “We see potential for a cyclical rally over the next 3-6 months in base metals driven by short covering and improving in demand expectations.”
And, in turn, it cuts 2016 earnings forecasts for the ‘big four’.
UBS does, however, upgrade Ukraine based iron pellet producer Ferrexpo (LON:FXPO) albeit to ‘neutral’ from ‘sell’.
Elsewhere, Sports Direct (LON:SPD) has been downgraded by Morgan Stanley which now rates the retailer as ‘equal weight’ rather than ‘overwieght’.
RBC cut engineering group Weir (LON:WEIR) to ‘underperform’ from ‘sector perform’.
Hays dropped to ‘hold’ from ‘buy’ in the eyes of HSBC, and similarly Investec downgraded Carrillion (LON:CCLN) to ‘hold’.
Sainsbury remains a ‘conviction sell’ according to Goldman Sachs which nevertheless increases its price target to 185p from 155p.
Finncap is keen on Constellation Healthcare (LON:CHT), which it says is building into a leading provider of US medical billing services.
Organic growth in the billing division has been strong at 14%, but there is a keen focus on acquisitions to accelerate the addition of doctors to the platform.
The broker has upgraded its 2016 earnings estimate by 30% and kept its 280p target price. Shares rose 4% to 165p.