On the face of it, this sounds like a positive piece of news for Cairn, however, we think ONGC are most likely to look to a acquire an additional stake in Cairns 70 per cent...

The April IEA report supports our belief that rising inventories, moderating demand growth and Saudi Arabia’s commitment to put more oil into the market will put downward pressure on oil prices.

And we still haven’t seen the full brunt of the lagged impact of the Fed’s rate hikes.

This suggests there is a possibility that the consortium could still revise/raise its offer, in our view.

While we had not considered a private equity deal, there is no reason why, if the price were right, this should not be a legitimate option.

We expect Nokia device gross margin to stabilize resulting from the transition to lower-cost entry-level phones and a much stronger mid-range and high-end portfolio.

Our intermediate-term ‘strong buy’ rating for Intel stands — first-quarter PC inventory rebuild should temper seasonal weakness.

We caution against extrapolating too much from this figure to any individual company’s outlook. The 6.9% figure does not necessarily translate to the average payment increase a given MA plan ultimately receives.

It’s not going to be that much of a negative for the consumers. After all, they’re paying much lower prices than we’ve paid for six months… ( It ) might actually make everybody a winner...

We remain bullish on gold over the medium to long term and believe that the arguments for gold outweigh the arguments against.

This makes us confident that Compass should be able to sell this business for a price in excess of 1.2 billion pounds.

Financially, there might be reason behind the madness.

Compass’ statement should be a relief to the market as trading appears to be in line with expectations.

Bulls hoping for a more substantial move in Intel may be disappointed, however. There was nothing in Intel’s comment that can be used to support an improved outlook for either the third or fourth quarter.

We noted with interest that the often overlooked Furniture & Appliances industry sector turned out to be one of the stronger performers in 2001…based on market capitalization, Furniture & Appliances ranks 11th out of the...

Management believes the group can generate half of its profits from outside the U.K. within three years from the current portfolio of businesses – we think highlights the strong organic growth possibilities within the business.

The euro zone has just edged ahead of Japan, and is now the region investors would most like to overweight in the next year.

Although some of the company’s problems can be attributed to weakness in the PC market and inventory reduction efforts, AMD also continues to lose ground to Intel in the [microprocessor] market.

Fear of inflation has caused (U.S.) fund managers to raise their cash positions to overweight from underweight. It has also driven a dramatic move out of U.S. equities, the perceived risk area.

Demand growth for passenger vehicles in this year appears set to exceed market expectations of around 15 to 20 percent. Growth rate may fluctuate in response to changes in government policies and economic hiccups, but...

However, there is a risk that less easing is in store since the 3 percent growth we expect, on average, in the first half of 2006, may not be enough to convince the Fed to...

The fundamentals in the mobile handset environment do not appear to be improving. In fact, recent news from component suppliers all point towards order push outs and delays in the release of new handsets.

We believe Yahoo! is ‘priced to perfection,’ and that near-flawless quarters are required to support its multiple.

(They are) basically doing all the right things. This is a bull’s wish list.

We believe UPS is the most financially fit, well managed parcel company and, in our opinion, one of the quality management bets in the industry.

By capitalizing on its superiority in branch network and customer contracts, the new (merged) entity could achieve and sustain superior profitability against (rivals) in the sector.

Viacom will, in our view, benefit from substantial consolidator economics over the next 12 to 18 months and a larger component of more-recession-resistant local advertising, as opposed to national advertising.

Any reading at or above 61 percent generates ‘sell’ signals, whereas any reading at or below 50 percent generates ‘buy’ signals. The model remains well into ‘sell’ territory.

This outcome was the likeliest coming in and already seemingly reflected in markets; both bonds and stocks may be marginally disappointed (for different reasons), but there are no major market implications, in our view.

While retailing stocks may no longer lead the market, they should be carried along with it, assuming the stock market is higher at year-end as we expect. Underpinning the upward move will be exceptionally strong...

Technology, demographics and industry consolidation are driving profound changes in the private-client business.

From a hardware standpoint, the largest exposure outside of Sony itself is Microsoft, which could benefit if the company is able to overcome supply problems with Xbox 360.

It remains to be seen whether Fiat Auto can deliver a sustained improvement given the pressure in the marketplace which has forced considerably better positioned automotive manufacturers like Peugeot and Renault to revise down their...

We believe that the goodwill impairment is unsurprising given most of the other incumbent operators and wireless players have already taken these impairments for overpaying for acquisitions during the last 1990s.

Clearly there are a number of issues that could affect the price, including Hilton’s unusually low tax charge and the lack of new synergies between HHC and Hilton International, given that the businesses already share...

Cash still appears to be the only asset class with a near-certain increasing and competitive expected return.

AMD’s product advantages continue to be the most apparent in this [server] market.

We believe this configuration has lasted so long it may be having a beguiling effect on the market. And with no obvious catalyst for a reappearance of volatility, the obvious risk is that investors take...

We continue to take a cautious stance on the specialty retail sector and expect group performance will be inconsistent in the near term, reflecting tough fourth-quarter comparisons and uncertainty about consumer spending.

Any stabilization of the main candidates in their present numbers in the next polls may prompt some tactical buying in Peru, given wide relative spreads to usual peers.

We met with BT’s management yesterday and we did discuss the possibility of a break up. He thought the financial engineering could work but he thought long term separating BT Wholesale from BT Retail would...

We believe CFO Mike Lehman is one of the most conservative on the Street, and we have no reason to believe there are any accounting irregularities at the company.

Hurricane Katrina has been an eye opener, highlighting the inadequacy of the global refining system.

We think the bigger story for the second half of the year will be a significant rotation into the more defensive sectors of the stock market, and that these sectors become consensus favorites by the...

There is an unmistakable change of tone in the survey this month.

The level of risk appetite this month is among the highest that we have seen and cash levels are at the lowest levels the survey has ever recorded.

We expect group’s performance to continue to be volatile as concerns about a promotional and lackluster holiday season remain the near-term focus.

Other suitors may appear for one or both companies. However, European power is changing rapidly and neither company can ignore the implications.

This implies to us that UK gambling companies are probably underestimating the negative effects of a smoking ban on their businesses.

Deflationary pressures in food continue to be severe and are not projected to ease until the second quarter. Better buying and category management efforts are expected to result in some gross margin improvement.