These Stocks Were Getting Some Analyst Love On Tuesday

Although the S&P 500 has struggled to build momentum in recent days, in part due to more tempered language from the Street, analysts showered some love on five stocks on Tuesday, raising their price targets on them, and in some cases their ratings.

In this article, we’ll take a closer look at yesterday’s analyst action and commentary on Baidu Inc (ADR) (NASDAQ:BIDU), Columbia Sportswear Company (NASDAQ:COLM), Cirrus Logic, Inc. (NASDAQ:CRUS), Jabil Circuit, Inc. (NYSE:JBL), and Kirby Corporation (NYSE:KEX) and see what the smart money thinks of each stock.

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Analysts at Deutsche Bank gave the thumbs up to Baidu Inc (ADR) (NASDAQ:BIDU) yesterday, maintaining their ‘Buy’ rating on the stock and raising their price target on it to $219 from $182. Like other Chinese internet stocks, Baidu shares have recovered somewhat since early-August, as sentiment in the sector improves. Moreover, Baidu recently entered into an alliance with NVIDIA Corporation (NASDAQ:NVDA) to create a self-driving car platform. If successful, Baidu could have another valuable cash flow stream aside from search, which is be fraught with political sensitivity in China. According to our records, the smart money tempered its enthusiasm for the Chinese search engine in the second quarter. Of the 749 hedge funds that we track which filed 13Fs for the June quarter, 56 of them owned shares of Baidu Inc (ADR) (NASDAQ:BIDU) at the end of June, down by 16 funds from the end of March.

Count Canaccord analyst Camilo Lyon as a fan of Columbia Sportswear Company (NASDAQ:COLM), as the analyst upgraded the stock to ‘Buy’ from ‘Hold’ and hiked his target price on it to $72 from $59 on Tuesday. Lyon believes improved idiosyncratic and macro factors will help boost demand, while diminishing forex headwinds and a more profitable direct-to-consumer shift could drive earnings for the quarters to come. 20 funds in our system had a long position in Columbia Sportswear Company (NASDAQ:COLM) at the end of the second quarter, unchanged from that end of the first quarter.

On the next page, we’ll examine why analysts gave the thumbs up to Cirrus Logic, Jabil Circuit, and Kirby Corporation yesterday.

Given all the analyst enthusiasm for Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL)’s stock of late, it’s not surprising that some of the joy has spilled onto Cirrus Logic, Inc. (NASDAQ:CRUS). In an event that also transpired yesterday, Canaccord analyst Matthew Ramsay hiked his price target on Cirrus to $65 per share from $56, in part due to a meeting with the company’s management. Although many in the market think Cirrus’ earnings may soon peak, Ramsay believes Cirrus’ broad portfolio of products, including amplifiers, audio codecs, and others, will help sustain solid earnings. Jim Simons‘ Renaissance Technologies owned 119,613 shares of Cirrus Logic, Inc. (NASDAQ:CRUS) at the end of June.

Jabil Circuit, Inc. (NYSE:JBL) shareholders are breathing a sigh of relief after the biggest name on the Street, Goldman Sachs, upgraded the stock to ‘Neutral’ from ‘Sell’. In addition, the famed investment bank bumped up its price target on it to $21 per share from $16. One reason for the upgrade is the potential for Jabil’s September 27 analyst day to improve sentiment around the stock. Jabil was also upgraded to ‘Buy’ from ‘Neutral’ by UBS, which cited the company’s cash flow as nearing an inflection point thanks to its own dealings with Apple. Anand Parekh‘s Alyeska Investment Group established a new stake of almost 1.2 million shares in Jabil Circuit, Inc. (NYSE:JBL) in the second quarter.

Kirby Corporation (NYSE:KEX) received some analyst love from RBC Capital yesterday after analyst John Barnes upgraded the stock to ‘Outperform’ from ‘Sector Perform’ and set a target price of $68 per share on it, up from the previous target of $55. Although shares of the company are off from their June highs, Barnes thinks that Kirby’s inland barging business is “nearing a bottom and should begin to rebound within the next few quarters.” The number of funds in our database long Kirby Corporation (NYSE:KEX) fell by one during the second quarter to 19 at the end of June.

Disclosure: None