Carrols (TAST) (DXCM) (CLNE) (THFF) (PESI) (ALU) Ratings, Price Targets

Carrols Restaurant (NASDAQ: TAST), DexCom (NASDAQ: DXCM), Clean Energy Fuels (NASDAQ: CLNE), First Financial Corporation (NASDAQ: THFF), Perma-Fix Environmental Services (NASDAQ: PESI) and Alcatel Lucent (NYSE: ALU) ratings and price targets.

DexCom (DXCM) had its “market perform” rating reiterated by Oppenheimer (NYSE:OPY).

Clean Energy Fuels (CLNE) is now covered by Mizuho Securities. They placed an “underperform” rating and a price target of $10.00 on the company.

Carrols Restaurant (TAST) was downgraded by Zacks Investment Research from an “outperform” rating to a “neutral” rating.

First Financial Corporation (THFF) was downgraded by Zacks Investment Research from an “outperform” rating to a “neutral” rating.

Perma-Fix Environmental Services (PESI) was downgraded by Zacks Investment Research from an “outperform” rating to a “neutral” rating.

Alcatel Lucent (ALU) was upgraded by Deutsche Bank (NYSE:DB) from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating.

Ratings on (ALU) (AMTD) (ANF) (ASEI) (CLI) Downgraded

Analysts downgraded their ratings on Alcatel Lucent (NYSE: ALU), TD Ameritrade (NASDAQ: AMTD), Abercrombie & Fitch (NYSE: ANF), American Science And Engineering Incorporated (NASDAQ: ASEI) and Mack-Cali Realty Corp. (NYSE: CLI) today.

Societe Generale downgraded Alcatel Lucent (ALU) from a “hold” rating to a “sell” rating.

Goldman Sachs (NYSE:GS) downgraded TD Ameritrade (AMTD) to a “neutral” rating.

Susquehanna downgraded Abercrombie & Fitch (ANF) from a “positive” rating to a “neutral” rating.

The Benchmark Company downgraded American Science And Engineering Incorporated (ASEI) from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating. They have a price target of $90.00 on the company.

Bank of America (NYSE:BAC) downgraded Mack-Cali Realty Corp. (CLI) from a “buy” rating to a “neutral” rating.

Ratings on (ALTE) (ALU) (AREX) (ARG) (CCIH) Upgraded

Analysts upgraded their ratings on Alterra Capital Holdings Ltd. (NASDAQ: ALTE), Alcatel Lucent (NYSE: ALU) Approach Resources Inc. (NASDAQ: AREX), Airgas, Inc. (NYSE: ARG) and Chinacache International Holdings Limited (NASDAQ: CCIH)

Sterne Agee upgraded Alterra Capital Holdings Ltd. (ALTE) from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating. They have a price target of $26.00 on the company.

Capstone upgraded Alcatel Lucent (ALU) from a “sell” rating to a “hold” rating.

Wells Fargo & Co. (NYSE:WFC) upgraded Approach Resources Inc. (AREX) from a “market perform” rating to an “outperform” rating.

Soleil Securities upgraded Airgas, Inc. (ARG) from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating.

Deutsche Bank (NYSE:DB) upgraded Chinacache International Holdings Limited (CCIH) from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating.

Alcatel (ALU) Seeking Buyer for Telecom-Gear Unit

Alcatel-Lucent (NYSE:ALU) is looking for a potential buyers of its unit which sells telecom gear and phones, which is estimated to be valued at $1.5 billion, possibly more.

Sales of the company come in at close to $1.5 billion annually.

Along with an individual buyer, another option would be an initial public offering, according to people close to the situation.

Some companies being considered as potential buyers include Hewlett-Packard (NYSE:HPQ) and Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT), along with unnamed private-equity firms.

Alcatel-Lucent is up about 86 percent so far in 2011. It was trading at $6.00, down $0.07, or 1.07 percent, as of 12:30 PM EDT.

Alcatel-Lucent (ALU) Rally Should Continue

The performance by Alcatel-Lucent (NYSE:ALU) so far in 2011 is impressive to say the least, but it could be just the beginning of a long bull run by the company, according to Goldman Sachs (NYSE:GS)

Goldman upgraded Alcatel-Lucent from "Neutral" to "Hold," saying new businesses are structurally-attractive, helping the company to overcome losses from legacy units.

They see the Alcatel-Lucent having an upside of 46 percent for investors.

Alcatel-Lucent was trading at $5.78, gaining $0.44, or 8.24 percent, as of 2:19 PM EDT.

Hewlett-Packard (HPQ) Shareholders Approve Board Slate

A slate of new board members presented to Hewlett-Packard Co. (NYSE:HPQ) shareholders were approved, bringing the total directors to 13, and apparently giving support to the direction the company is being taken.

The new board members approved are Meg Whitman, former chief executive of eBay Inc. (NASDAQ:EBAY), Shumeet Banerji, chief executive of consulting firm Booz & Co.; Gary Reiner, former chief information officer of General Electric Co. (NYSE:GE); Patricia Russo, former chief executive of Alcatel-Lucent (NYSE:ALU); and Dominique Senequier, chief executive of AXA SA’s AXA Private Equity.

Analysts believe the new directors will aid the technology leader as it expands its software offerings and tries to build its own suite of Internet applications and services to compete with rivals such as International Business Machines Corp. (NYSE:IBM), Amazon.com Inc. (NASDAQ:AMZN) and Salesforce.com Inc. (NYSE:CRM)

It also appears this is significant in moving the company forward in regard to the board itself, which has been criticized heavily since the resignation of former CEO Mark Hurd.

Hewlett-Packard closed Wednesday at $42.07, gaining $0.33, or 0.79 percent.

Apple (AAPL), Qualcomm (QCOM), Cisco (CSCO) Under Selling Pressure

Shares of Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL), Qualcomm (NASDAQ:QCOM) and Cisco (NASDAQ:CSCO) are all down today as the unfolding crisis in Japan continues to pressure the broader market lower.

"Fearing a lengthy disruption to Japan's manufacturing operations and the potential for extensive fallout from the crippled nuclear reactors, investors were selling stocks early Tuesday," said TheStreet.

The Nasdaq recovered somewhat but was still down nearly 2% by midday.

Wall Street's selling mood didn't exactly spare some of its darlings.
Apple shares fell 3.5% to $341.21 in early trading, which later moderated to $325.23, down more than 2% at noon, even though the company has not been able to supply enough of its new iPad 2s to meet demand.

Wireless chip shop Qualcomm initially fell 5% and rallied a bit to remain 3% down on concerns that mobile phone sales and production will slow, as Japan struggles with widespread devastation.

The selloff also knocked down networking giants like Cisco, which bounced off a new 52-week low and remained down 2.5% at $17.40. Meanwhile, networking gearmakers Alcatel-Lucent (NYSE:ALU) and Ericsson (NASDAQ:ERIC) had been down 5%, were only down 1% and 4% by midday.




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Intel (INTC) Continues to Miss the Mark in ARM, Other Areas

On Monday, Mark Moskowitz, JP Morgan IT (NYSE:JPM) hardware analyst, lowered his 2011 PC unit estimates from up 9.5% year to year to up 7.0% year to year due to several reasons.

He attributed the lower estimates to "stalling PC demand in China, weak global consumer PC demand, demand leakage to tablets, an expected deceleration in commercial PC growth, and the elongation of the useful lives of PCs.

"In addition, the top four PC OEMs (over 50% of total PC demand) have all recently missed and/or lowered guidance, while a few notebook ODMs recently lowered 1Q11 shipment estimates. As a result, we believe Intel is at risk of missing the midpoint of its 1Q11 revenue guidance."

The Atom was Intel's first misfire. I noted back in January 2009 that Intel (NASDAQ:INTC) lost as much a $1 billion is misjudging the success of the netbook and switching production from more lucrative notebook chips like the Penryn to make up for a shortfall in Atom chips.

Companies which are or have been ARM licensees include Alcatel (ALU), Atmel (ATML), Broadcom (BRCM), Cirrus Logic (CRUS), Digital Equipment Corporation, Freescale, Intel (through DEC), LG Group, Marvell Technology Group (MRVL), NEC, Nvidia (NVDA), NXP , Oki, Qualcomm (QCOM), Samsung, Sharp, ST Microelectronics (STM), Symbios Logic, Texas Instruments (TI), TSMC (TSMC), VLSI Technology (VSLI), Yamaha and ZiiLABS.




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Alcatel-Lucent (NYSE:ALU), AMEC (LSE:AMEC) Lead Europe Higher

European stocks climbed Thursday, led by Alcatel-Lucent SA (NYSE:ALU) and AMEC PLC (LSE:AMEC), as bullish corporate news and falling crude-oil prices boosted sentiment.

The Stoxx Europe 600 index gained 0.3% to end at 283.6. It earlier hit an intraday high of 285.8.

The Stoxx index pared its gains, and some markets — such as Spain and Italy — finished lower, after European Central Bank President Jean-Claude Trichet said that a rate hike in April is “possible” but not certain and will depend on incoming data. Read more about Trichet’s comments.

In Spain, the IBEX 35 index dropped 0.7%, as shares of Banco Santander SA (ES:SAN) slipped 1.7%. Italy’s FTSE MIB index closed down 0.4%.

The euro rose 0.6% to $1.3939 after Trichet’s comments. The ECB earlier in the day kept its key interest rate on hold at a record low, as expected.

The U.K.’s FTSE 100 index (UK:UKX) surged 1.5% to 6,005.1, outperforming other regional markets.

“The main reason [for the gains] is that crude prices have come off” their recent highs, said Joshua Raymond, strategist at City Index.

Alcatel-Lucent was trading in New York at $5.36, up $0.11, or 2.19 percent, as of 1:54 PM EST. AMEC was trading in London at 1,190.00, up 61.00, or 5.40 percent.



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Analysts Scream for Cisco (CSCO) to Defend Routing Business

After weak guidance, analysts following Cisco (Nasdaq:CSCO) are shouting for the company to abandon its consumer business portfolio and return its focus to its core routing business.

According to Morningstar analyst Grady Burkett, he said in a Reuters article, "What investors would like is to see them more focused on their core market, like routers, switches and data centers, and de-emphasize or even exit some of these consumer businesses,"

Some of the assets analysts would like to see Cisco shed are its cable business unit Scientific Atlanta, the Cius tablet computer line, and its consumer router unit Linksys

At one time Cisco's CEO and Chairman John Chamber had hoped the increase in consumer Internet traffic from the products would end up migrating to an increase in sales of routing equipment. But with consumer product sales plunging 15 percent in the latest quarter, and competitors like Alcatel-Lucent (NYSE:ALU) and Juniper (NYSE:JNPR) chipping away at their core business, it appears the company has a quick decision to make on what business they are in.

Cisco was trading at $18.52, down $0.04, or -0.22 percent, as of 2:03 PM EST.

Will Alcatel-Lucent's (NYSE:ALU) 2.5" Cell Tower Catch On?

Almost everything electronic—modems, PCs, cellphones—becomes dramatically smaller and more powerful each year. Not cell towers. They're still big, ugly, and expensive. Most were designed with the simple goal of transmitting plain old phone calls, so towers are easily overwhelmed by smartphone users who now want to not only call grandma but also upload photos and stream TV shows. The current solution to network congestion is "building bigger and bigger cell towers in more places," says the president of Alcatel-Lucent's (NYSE:ALU) wireless division, Wim Sweldens. That's cost-prohibitive in vast rural expanses and pretty much impossible in dense urban areas. "It's no longer sustainable," he says.

On Feb. 7, Alcatel-Lucent (ALU) introduced a Rubik's cube-sized device called lightRadio that could help bring an end to the bigger-is-better approach. Most of today's cell towers are 200-foot monsters topped with an unsightly gangle of antennae. Each lightRadio unit measures 2.5 inches across and weighs just 10.5 oz. That compact package contains radios and antennae for each of the major cellular technologies—2G, 3G, and LTE. Carriers can plop them wherever they need more coverage, so long as an electrical source is available—on telephone poles, building rooftops, and bus stop shelters. "This will dramatically change the way mobile networks are built," says Sweldens.






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Alcatel-Lucent (ALU) Addresses Portable LTE with lightRadio

Jean-Pierre Lartigue, product marketing and strategy for Alcatel-Lucent’s (NYSE:ALU) wireless networks business, says the current generation of radio access equipment is not acceptable for all of today’s cellular network needs given the site acquisition and other costs related to macro base stations. So picocells have arrived to address these needs.

Alcatel-Lucent has a new product in this space called lightRadio. It’s a 2G/3G/LTE solution that’s about the size of a child’s block and can support up to 48 users.

Lartigue says China Mobile (NYSE:CHL), Orange, Verizon (NYSE:VZ), and two other wireless carriers already have endorsed the product, which will be in trials by the end of the year, and available in commercial quantities starting next year.

Along with lightRadio, Alcatel-Lucent has introduced a baseband unit in the form of a chipset. The unit, which can be located with the picocell, or be placed remotely to serve multiple picocells, creates the digital signal and brings it to the IP network, says Lartigue. Basically, it does traffic conversion and prioritization.





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Verizon (VZ), Ericsson (ERIC), Alcatel-Lucent (ALU), Samsung Pushing VoLTE

Verizon (NYSE:VZ), Ericsson (NASDAQ:ERIC), Alcatel-Lucent (NYSE:ALU), Samsung were all seen pushing VoLTE at Mobile World Congress; doesn't look good for VoLGA.

With Verizon Wireless outlining an aggressive plan to implement the Voice over LTE (VoLTE) platform, the last momentum behind an alternative approach, VoLGA, seems to have died. The main carrier backer of VoLGA, T-Mobile, says it will stop pushing the technology, which it had presented as a simpler route to supporting voice on 4G networks than VoLTE, which is based on IMS.

VoLGA was conceived as a middle road between full IMS-based voice and the 3GPP's more basic solution of falling back to circuit switched networks. It ran circuit switched voice over packet networks using a gateway system developed by Kineto Wireless. But in an interview with Light Reading Mobile, (http://www.lightreading.com/document.asp?doc_id=204581&) Olivier Baujard - CTO of TMo's parent firm Deutsche Telekom - said: "We have not created with VoLGA the traction we wanted or hoped. We will implement the IMS-based solution, with CSFB ."

Verizon and its key vendors, Ericsson and Alcatel-Lucent, plus LG and Samsung, were among those demonstrating VoLTE at Mobile World Congress. The GSM Association, which backs the platform, will run an interoperability test event in September, hosted by Vodafone and China Mobile at their respective testing centers in Dusseldorf and Beijing.

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Shares of Alcatel-Lucent (NYSE:ALU) Shoot Up on Strong Guidance

Alcatel-Lucent (NYSE:ALU) soared today on a solid quarter and strong guidance.

Profit in the fourth quarter surged on an increased demand for broadband networks, said the company in its earnings report.

Earnings in quarter rose to 340 million euros ($464 million), or 13 European cents a share, from €46 million, or 2 cents a share, in the same quarter last year.

Strong demand in North American, Brazil and Mexico helped drive revenue to a €4.86 billion, or 23 percent gain. Analysts were looking for €347 million.

Chief Executive Ben Verwaayen said, “As we enter into 2011, I am more confident than ever in our ability to transform into a normal company.”

Also moving the share price was the margin guidance, which the company says is expected to reach more than 5 percent.

CFO Paul Tufano says “positive macro-trends” will help the performance of the company remain sustainable, and sees it continuing on through 2011 and beyond.

Alcatel-Lucent was trading at $4.34, up $0.78, or 21.91 percent, as of 1:17 PM EST.

InterDigital (Nasdaq:IDCC) Has Strong Patent Moat

InterDigital (Nasdaq:IDCC) has enjoyed a couple of days of big gains, as the financial media has pointed out some of the strengths enjoyed by the company, including their strong portfolio of patents, which results in about 80 percent of the giant mobile service providers carrying wireless products from the company.

The company continues to build up their patent portfolio, which will over time generate predictable and sustainable cash flow for them.

After a report from Barron's and additional coverage afterwards, InterDigital has skyrocketed over the last two trading sessions, having the potential to climb significantly more going forward.

The company is considered cheap, trading at about 15x FY10 EPS estimates. Over the last 12 year, InterDigital generated almost $148 million in free cash flow as well. The latter metric has been volatile, but is expected to continue to move up in 2011.

Measuring how they measure up against competitors, Alcatel-Lucent (NYSE:ALU) is expected to trade at 18.2x full year 2011 estimates and QUALCOMM (Nasdaq:QCOM) 18.1x.

InterDigital closed Monday at $53.51, gaining $2.70, or 5.31 percent.

NeoPhotonics (NYSE:NPTN) Shares Soar on Opening Day of IPO

Shares of NeoPhotonics (NYSE:NPTN) opened with a bang on the New York Stock Exchange, after the company priced shares at the high-end of the proposed price range at $11 a share.

NeoPhotonics business selling circuits to tech giants like Cisco Systems Inc. (Nasdaq:CSCO) and Alcatel-Lucent SA (NYSE:ALU). The chips they sale are used by the companies to make networking gear.

Sales from the company are expected to grow on the increasing demand for online video.

Shares were originally offered in the range of $9 to $11, but were bumped up to $11 a share, and the number of shares offered were increased from 7 million to 7.5 million.

Neophotonics was trading at $14.02 as of 12:33 PM EST.

Sprint (NYSE:S) Capex on 'Network Vision' Estimated to Yield Up to $11 Billion

In a move to enhance customer experience, Sprint (NYSE:S) has hired Ericsson, Alcatel-Lucent (NYSE:ALU) and Samsung to re-engineer its wireless network infrastructure.

Dubbed 'Network Vision,' the new network, when completed, will include improvements in data speed, data quality and better in-building coverage.

There will also be a reduction of operating costs and more effective expansion of 4G as a result of the initiative.

All three partners have been designated a specific geographical region to cover.

Sprint has committed about $4 billion to $5 billion over the next several years to implement the changes, which they see as yielding up to $11 billion over a period of seven years.