Health & Fitness
Health and Fitness
Health and Fitness
Thu, February 5, 2009 Zacks Bull & Bear of the Day Highlights: Myriad Genetics, School Specialty, Exxon, Chevron and Transocean
CHICAGO--([ BUSINESS WIRE ])--Zacks Equity Research picks Myriad Genetics (Nasdaq: [ MYGN ]) as Bull of the Day and School Specialty, Inc. (Nasdaq: [ SCHS ]) as Bear of the Day. In addition, the analysts at Zacks Equity Research discuss the latest on Exxon Mobil (NYSE: [ XOM ]), Chevron (NYSE: [ CVX ]) and Transocean (NYSE: [ RIG ]).
Full analysis of all these stocks is available at: [ http://at.zacks.com/?id=2678 ]
Bull of the Day
Myriad Genetics (Nasdaq: [ MYGN ]) relies on its predictive medicine for its revenue generation and is currently seeing solid growth in this business. On February 3, 2009, Myriad reported fiscal 2Q09 financial results ended December 31, 2008.
For the 3-month period ended December 31, 2008, total revenues increased to $84.4 million from $56.7 million in the same 3 months in 2007, an increase of 48.7%. This growth resulted primarily from an increase in molecular diagnostic revenues, which were $84 million this quarter, compared to $53.1 million in the same quarter of the prior year.
This 58% product revenue growth resulted primarily from an increase in the Company's sales and marketing efforts, including expansion of the Company's women's health sales force to 100 sales representatives, and continuation of the direct-to-consumer marketing campaign, which the Company believes has resulted in improved physician acceptance and adoption of its molecular diagnostic products. Sequentially, growth was 20% from the first fiscal quarter of 2008. Sales from molecular diagnostics were way above our estimate of $74.5 million.
Bear of the Day
School Specialty, Inc. (Nasdaq: [ SCHS ]) is a company serving the pre-K-12 [ education ] market by providing products, services, and ideas which enhance student achievement and development to educators and schools across the U.S. School Specialty's family of brands serves more than 116,000 schools throughout the U.S. and Canada, with a comprehensive range of more than 100,000 products.
Back on November 20, School Specialty reported disappointing results for its fiscal second quarter, and management lowered its guidance for the fiscal year 2009. The shortfall was due to a decline in state revenue. SCHS is highly dependent on state and local governments for its revenues. A weak economy and de-leveraging in the [ credit ] markets will only exacerbate the problems in local government funding.
We expect this trend to continue, and that will hurt School Specialty's results. We reiterate our Sell rating on SCHS and $11 target price. School Specialty is scheduled to report fiscal third quarter results on February 19.
Recent Analysis from the Analyst Blog
Oil Inventories Continue to Grow
With the economy expected to continue shedding jobs in the coming months and the full impact of the upcoming stimulus package still some time off, the near-term outlook for demand remains grim. In this anemic demand environment, the inventory overhang has become a significant price driver, particularly for the shorter end of the forward curve.
This situation is expected to change as OPEC's supply cuts take effect -- most likely in the spring months -- and visibility on the U.S. economy improves. While a renewed push to new lows in oil prices cannot be ruled out in the coming days, we think that the commodity is close to bottom levels at present.
While we continue to recommend defensive names like Exxon (NYSE: [ XOM ]) and Chevron (NYSE: [ CVX ]), we like the relatively more high-beta names such as Transocean (NYSE: [ RIG ]).
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About the Bull and Bear of the Day
Every day, the analysts at Zacks Equity Research select two stocks that are likely to outperform (Bull) or underperform (Bear) the markets over the next 3-6 months.
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