- Morgan Stanley analyst John Marren said he initiated
coverage of Lattice Semiconductor Corp with an outperform
rating and set a 12-month target price of $45 on the stock.
-- Marren said he expects Lattice, a maker of programmable
logic devices used in communications, computers and industrial
products, to yield earnings per share of $1.94 for the fiscal
year ending March 1997 and $2.34 for the 1998 fiscal year.
-- The analyst said his basic investment thesis is that
Lattice is undervalued on the basis of its price to earnings
multiple compared to peers in its market segment, Altera Corp
and Xilinx Inc .
-- Marren said Lattice derives about 50 percent of its
revenues from high density devices and the other half from low
density ones.
-- He said he expects the company's high density business
to grow about 45 percent over the next year, while the low
density business remains relatively flat.
-- As a result, Marren projected the company would see
overall growth of 22 percent in fiscal 1998, roughly the same
as its peers.
-- "I think (Lattice) is growing as fast as Xilinx or
Altera, but it's five to six multiple points cheaper," Marren
said.
-- Eric Auchard, New York Newsdesk, 212-859-1736
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Let's see $2.34 for fisca year 1998 at 22 PE puts the stock price at $51.48. The analysts need to begin to raise both the PE and growth rate for this company. Well, this is a start. Morgan Stanely is one of the best "conservative" analysts out on the street.
EKS |
