On the surface, oil seems like it’s going nowhere… but the story is very different below the waterline. Keeping up with crude oil is a bit of a migraine these days. nbsp;It’s an essential task, of...div class="feedflare" a href="http://feeds.taipanpublishinggroup.com/~ff/taipan?a=6NiNcS-kFuA:OkuO7KLYUcM:yIl2AUoC8zA"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/taipan?d=yIl2AUoC8zA" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.taipanpublishinggroup.com/~ff/taipan?a=6NiNcS-kFuA:OkuO7KLYUcM:V_sGLiPBpWU"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/taipan?i=6NiNcS-kFuA:OkuO7KLYUcM:V_sGLiPBpWU" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.taipanpublishinggroup.com/~ff/taipan?a=6NiNcS-kFuA:OkuO7KLYUcM:F7zBnMyn0Lo"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/taipan?i=6NiNcS-kFuA:OkuO7KLYUcM:F7zBnMyn0Lo" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.taipanpublishinggroup.com/~ff/taipan?a=6NiNcS-kFuA:OkuO7KLYUcM:wd9GD17jvC4"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/taipan?d=wd9GD17jvC4" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.taipanpublishinggroup.com/~ff/taipan?a=6NiNcS-kFuA:OkuO7KLYUcM:l6gmwiTKsz0"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/taipan?d=l6gmwiTKsz0" border="0"/img/a /divimg src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/taipan/~4/6NiNcS-kFuA" height="1" width="1"/

For Immediate Release

Chicago, IL – October 14, 2009 – Zacks Equity Research highlights VimpelCom (VIP) as the Bull of the Day and Rite Aid Corporation (RAD) the Bear of the Day. In addition, Zacks Equity Research provides analysis on Johnson & Johnson (JNJ), Elan Pharmaceuticals (ELN) and Gilead Sciences, Inc. (GILD).

Full analysis of all these stocks is available at http://at.zacks.com/?id=2676

Here is a synopsis of all five stocks:

Bull of the Day:

We reaffirm our Outperform recommendation for VimpelCom (VIP), Russia's second largest cellular carrier with over 25% market share. Reported earnings in the last quarter outpaced the Zacks Consensus Estimate, driven by foreign exchange gains.

We continue to be intrigued by VimpelCom's successful sales growth trend and its ability to retain subscribers on a recurring basis, even as overall economic factors remain weak. The company is also progressing

...

Johnson & Johnson’s (JNJ) third quarter earnings of $1.20 surpassed the Zacks Consensus Estimate by 7 cents and by 3 cents from the year-ago period. However, the company reported revenues of $15.1 billion, a decline of 5.3% compared to the third quarter of 2008. While 2.8% of the decline in revenue was due to operational factors, foreign exchange movement was responsible for the remaining 2.5% decline. Sales in both domestic and international markets recorded declines of 8.1% and 2.5%, respectively. Johnson & Johnson’s diversified business model is helping the company pave its way through tough situations. For the second quarter in a row, the company’s medical devices segment posted higher revenues than the pharmaceuticals. While medical devices recorded an increase of 2.3% compared to the year-ago period, consumer products and pharmaceuticals recorded a year-over-year decline of 2.7% and 14.1%, respectively. While generic competition was primarily ...

Yesterday, Merck (MRK) updated the status of two of its pipeline candidates, both used to treat migraine. While the company abandoned MK-3207, it will continue to develop telcagepant (MK-0974). Although MK-3207 was found to be effective, it caused liver abnormalities in some patients on discontinuing the drug. Due to this, Merck has decided to abandon any further studies of the drug. The phase III trial conducted by Merck for telcagepant found it to be more effective than placebo for acute treatment of multiple migraine attacks. In another study, the safety of the product was compared to another migraine drug of Merck, Maxalt (rizatriptan). The company presented data from both trials at the International Headache Congress and plans to initiate discussions regarding the next steps with the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) later this year. The telcagepant trial was carried out on 1677 patients who ...

• Merck (NYSE:MRK) announced its plans to abandon an experimental treatment for migraines and to review Phase III clinical data on another migraine drug

• Morgan Stanley's (NYSE:MS) CEO John Mack will be replaced before year-end by current co-president James Gorman

• Abbott Labs (NYSE:ABT) announced that it bought the 90% of Evalve that it does not already own for $410 million

• Bank of America (NYSE:BAC) cut its rating on Electronic Arts (NASDAQ:ERTS) to "neutral"

• Wells Fargo (NYSE:WFC) lowered its rating on AIG (NYSE:AIG) to "underperform" asserting the firm currently is trading "significantly" above book value

• National Semiconductor (NYSE:NSM) reported fiscal first quarter earnings of 13 cents a share, 6 cents above estimates on revenues of $314 million

Zacks Investment Research

For Immediate Release

Chicago, IL – August 31, 2009 – Zacks.com announces the list of stocks featured in the Analyst Blog. Every day the Zacks Equity Research analysts discuss the latest news and events impacting stocks and the financial markets. Stocks recently featured in the blog include: Mylan (MYL), Sanofi-Aventis (SNY), Gilead Sciences (GILD), GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) and Freddie Mac (FRE).

Get the most recent insight from Zacks Equity Research with the free Profit from the Pros newsletter: http://at.zacks.com/?id=5513

Here are highlights from Friday’s Analyst Blog:

Mylan’s Portfolio Strengthens

We are pleased to hear that Mylan (MYL) has begun to market the generic version of BenzaClin (1% Clindamycin and 5% Benzoyl Peroxide Gel) for acne treatment, which was originally manufactured by Sanofi-Aventis (SNY). The drug has been developed under an agreement between its subsidiary,

...

We are pleased to hear that Mylan (MYL) has begun to market the generic version of BenzaClin (1% Clindamycin and 5% Benzoyl Peroxide Gel) for acne treatment, which was originally manufactured by Sanofi-Aventis (SNY). The drug has been developed under an agreement between its subsidiary, Mylan Pharmaceuticals and Dow Pharmaceutical Sciences, a subsidiary of Valeant Pharmaceuticals International.

Earlier this month, Dow received the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approval for the generic drug. Although the approval is good news for the company, we do not expect it to contribute significantly to the top line since BenzaClin had total U.S. sales of about $221 million for the 12 months ending June 30 (as per IMS data).

This is the third approval for Mylan in the month of August. A few days back, Mylan’s subsidiary Matrix Laboratories received tentative approval from the FDA under the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief

...

Merck (MRK) received a favorable ruling in a major patent-infringement suit yesterday against the largest generic player, Teva Pharmaceuticals (TEVA), on its top-selling drug Singulair. Teva was seeking the Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA) approval for selling a generic version of the drug for asthma and allergic rhinitis. The litigation has been continuing since Merck sued Teva in February 2007.

During the second quarter of 2009, Singulair recorded worldwide sales of $1.3 billion, up 16% from the year-ago period. The drug had total sales of $4.3 billion in fiscal 2008, accounting for about 18% of Merck’s total revenue. Defending Singulair’s patent was thus quite crucial for Merck.

We believe this is a major win for Merck as an unfavorable ruling would have hurt its top-line badly. The court not only upheld Merck's patent, but also issued an injunction blocking the approval of Teva's generics till Singulair’s patent

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Allergan, Inc. (AGN) once again beat expectations by posting a second-quarter profit of 75 cents per share (up 19% year over year), which was well above the Zacks Consensus Estimate of 68 cents per share. Profits were primarily driven by cost management and efficiencies. However, total revenues declined 3.6% to $1130.8 million in the reported quarter. Specialty pharmaceuticals sales declined 0.6% to $921.2 million. Eyecare pharmaceutical sales declined 2.5%. The strong performance of products like the Alphagan franchise, Lumigan, Combigan and Restasis was offset by weakness in the artificial tears segment. Botox sales declined 3.2% to $336.8 million. In addition to weak consumer spending, we believe negative news surrounding Botox’ safety record have affected sales. Going forward, we expect Botox sales to continue declining especially in the face of additional competition from Medicis Pharma’s (MRX) Dysport, which was launched recently in the U.S. Meanwhile, ...

Aradigm Corporation

(Public, OTC:ARDM)

Aradigm is a company with a lot of potential positive long-term gains, especially with regards to its product pipeline involving the inhaled Cipro product (ILCH) for BE and CF, however the short-term play is a very different story. This company lacks visibility and the ability to fully utilize press release syndication to maximize potential reach for investors, and also engages in massive dilution in order to maintain ongoing operations. Moreover, the financial position also suffers as the company is enduring a heavy amount of cash burn every year with zero revenues as of Q1 (Mar’09). There is also a big question mark when it comes to partnerships — who will step up to the plate and infuse the cash which is so badly sought after?

About

Aradigm Corporation is a specialty pharmaceutical company focused

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