Thursday, June 29, 2006

Calls of Note Part 4

- RBC Capital is raising their Q2 sales and EPS estimates for Gilead Sciences (NASDAQ:GILD) . Firm's new EPS is $0.59 (excludes $0.05 of option expenses) up from $0.56. They believe EPS outperformance is likely to be primarily driven by 1) strong volume growth for Truvada, 2) price increases across the HIV franchise, and 3) favorable currency. Although they believe the company is tracking ahead of FY06 guidance, they do not believe management is likely to raise HIV guidance until the launch of the triple-pill in Q3.

Firm increases Q2 forecast HIV sales to $464M from $441M. IMS data suggests an acceleration of q/q Truvada script growth to 15% and only a 1% decline for Viread, compared with 12% Truvada growth and an 8% decline in Viread last quarter. Gilead remains firm's top large-cap idea and they believe fundamentals remain strong. Reits Outperform rating and $73 tgt.

Notablecalls: I think this may be an actionable call.

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