Motorola Climbs; Barclays Upgrade; Bullish on New Phones
Motorola (MOT) shares are moving higher this morning after Barclays Capital analyst Jeff Kvaal upped his rating on the stock to Overweight from Equal Weight, while keeping his price target at $9. The stock closed yesterday at $6.32.
“Our checks indicate Android sell-through has been solid even post the Verizon Droid push,” he writes in a research note this morning. Kvaal expects the company to launch new Android-based phones this quarter at AT&T (T), Verizon (VZ) and possibly T-Mobile. The analyst contends that the company’s target of 11-14 million units for 2010 is reasonable; he expects 13 million. While feature phone declines have been steeper than expected, they are “ultimately inevitable” and don’t change his thesis. Meanwhile, he sees healthy demand in the company’s public safety unit.
