Analysts released new ratings for some health care stocks recently.
Amgen Inc. (AMGN, Financial) has been downgraded by analysts at Jefferies to hold from buy.
The firm set a new target price of $180, which represents a 7.2% decrease from its previous price target and a 10.9% upside from the current share price of $162.25. The price target per share now ranges between a low of $158.51 and a high of $212.
Jefferies’ downgrade rating is the second over the last 12 months after Credit Suisse downgraded the stock from outperform to neutral on Dec. 20, 2016. During this period, Amgen was upgraded once by Bank of America Merrill Lynch on Feb. 1 from neutral to buy.
Over the last 12 months, UBS (to neutral), Oppenheimer (to outperform), Mizuho (to buy), Gabelli & Co. (to hold) and Bernstein (to market perform) initiated coverage of Amgen.
Deutsche Bank initiated its coverage of Humana Inc. (HUM, Financial), Community Health Systems Inc. (CYH, Financial), Anthem Inc. (ANTM, Financial), UnitedHealth Group Inc. (UNH, Financial) and Cigna Corp. (CI, Financial). The price targets and ratings for each are shown in the chart below.
Cowen Group Inc. (COWN, Financial) released two ratings on Roche Holding AG (RHHBY, Financial) and Novartis AG (NVS, Financial). Cowen upgraded Roche to outperform from market perform and set a price target per share of $38, which represents a 8.6% increase from its previous target price of $35 per share and a 19.3% upside from the current share price. Following Cowen's new price target, the analysts’ average target price for Roche is now $35.075 per share, ranging from a low of $33 per share to a high of $38 per share. The recommendation rating is 1.7.
In contrast, the U.S. financial services firm headquartered in New York downgraded shares of Novartis to market perform from outperform and lowered the target price by 11.5% to $77 from the previous target of $87. Before Cowen released its new target price on Novartis, the analysts' average target price per share for the health care stock was $85.25, ranging between $80 and $92 per share. The recommendation rating is 2. Novartis is currently trading around $73.71 per share.
Disclosure: I have no positions in any stock mentioned in this article.
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