Industry Sectors: Telecommunications Equipment

Credit Suisse captures top honors for a fourth straight year — and for the sixth time in the past seven years.

Kulbinder Garcha & team Credit Suisse

second team Stuart Jeffrey & team Nomura

third team Gareth Jenkins & team UBS

Credit Suisse captures top honors for a fourth straight year — and for the sixth time in the past seven years. With offices in London and New York, the five-strong squad managed by Kulbinder Garcha, 33, provides what one admirer calls “innovative, truly top-down, global” perspectives on the world’s communications infrastructure. In August the group downgraded the ADRs of Finnish handset maker Nokia Corp., saying that U.S. manufacturers were winning the smart phone market. The receipts tumbled 8.3 percent, from $14.01 to $12.85, and lagged the sector by 1.6 percentage points through December. Stuart Jeffrey’s two-analyst Nomura team leaps from runner-up to second place. In January 2009 the pair issued a contrarian buy recommendation on Sweden’s Telefon AB L.M. Ericsson, at €61.31, on the belief that consensus earnings estimates were too low. By the end of the year, the stock had rung up gains of 7.5 percent, to €65.90. UBS’s Gareth Jenkins finished in second place last year as a solo act; in September he added an associate and expanded his coverage universe to include European semiconductor manufacturers, and the team takes third-place honors this year. Jenkins upgraded Spirent Communications to buy in March, calling shares of the U.K. line-testing equipment maker a steal at 43p. In November, with the stock up an eye-popping 115.2 percent, to 92.55p, he downgraded it to hold, on valuation. The stock climbed an additional 10.2 percent through December. One fan praises the team for offering “a unique point of view and new ideas that are actually useful,” and another appreciates the analysts’ efforts “to put underfollowed companies in their proper context.”

To go back to the index page, click on the Best European Analysts of the Year: 2010 All-Europe Research Team.

To read the article, click on: Reversal of Fortunes: The 2010 All-Europe Research Team

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