Oppenheimer Has Outperform Rating On Amedisys After Q2 (AMED)

Oppenheimer & Co. is maintaining its Outperform rating, but is lowering its earnings estimates and price target to $43 from $44 on shares of Amedisys, Inc. AMED after the company reported second quarter earnings that beat estimates. In the report Oppenheimer & Co. says, "AMED reported Q2:10 EPS of $1.13, slightly ahead of its pre-announcement EPS of $1.12. The company also revised its FY2010 guidance to a range of $4.20-$4.50 (down from $5.50-$5.70). Following the quarter, we are reducing our FY2010 and FY2011 EPS estimates to $4.37 and $3.92, down from $4.48 and $4.03. We are also lowering our price target from $44 to $43. AMED also announced a $60M stock buyback (~$0.30 accretive annualized), which should help support the stock and provide upside to earnings. We continue to like AMED for the long term, as we expect the culmination of the regulatory probes and the operational refinements to eventually be major catalysts for the stock."