Topic: Growth Stocks

The Wall Street Stock Forecaster Hotline – Friday, April 27, 2007

Article Excerpt

ALCOA INC. $35.99, New York symbol AA, aims to sell or spin-off its consumer aluminum products business, best known for Reynolds Wrap, by the end of 2007. It will also sell two of its smaller automotive parts operations. These businesses account for 16% of Alcoa’s total revenue, but only 3% of its earnings. These operations have less profit potential than Alcoa’s core aluminum production operations, so selling them makes sense. This will make Alcoa more sensitive to world aluminum markets, but aluminum demand and prices will probably remain high for at least the next several years. Alcoa is a buy. APPLE INC. $99.92, Nasdaq symbol AAPL, earned $0.87 a share in its second fiscal quarter ended March 31, 2007, up 85.1% from $0.47 a year earlier. Revenue rose 20.5%, to $5.3 billion from $4.4 billion, thanks to strong demand for iPod music players and Mac computers. The results exceeded earlier profit forecasts of $0.64 a share on revenue of $5.2 billion, and the stock…