Pritchard Capital Partners Lowers Price Target on Nabors Industries (NBR)

Pritchard Capital Partners is out with a brief research note, where it reiterates its Buy rating on Nabors Industries NBR; it also lowered its price target to $24 from $29. The PCP analysts said, “(The stock is) down ~8% last week, ~20% over the past month, and just 63% of its 52-week high, we believe the shares are oversold following recent chatter its US Offshore and Alaska business are likely to trend lower through 2010 and that growth on the international side may ramp up slower than some may have previously forecasted. As others likely lower estimates following next week’s earnings release we expect near-term multiple expansion to be subdued and are thus lowering our price target to $24, from $29, based on 6.5x 2011 EBITDA.” They added, “We are comfortable with our $0.95 2010 EPS estimate, which has always been below consensus, modeling a 30% decline in operating income in 2H10 for its Alaska business, relatively inconsequential operating income for its US Offshore division at just 7% of total contract driving operating income, and are expecting zero growth on the international side in 2Q10 and just a $5MM per quarter step-up through 2010.”