Bloomberg.com Europe reported on Friday that Heidelberger Druckmaschinen AG has hit a 10-Year Low after JPMorgan downgraded the company's recommendation from neutral to underweight:
JPMorgan cut its recommendation to ``underweight'' from ``neutral,'' arguing the Heidelberg, Germany-based company lacks growth and its reorganization plan is insufficient. The manufacturer said yesterday that it's facing a ``prolonged'' slowdown and announced a plan to cut 500 jobs and reduce costs by 100 million euros ($158 million).
The measures are ``insufficient to raise the profitability back to previous levels,'' Equinet said, downgrading the stock to ``reduce'' from ``hold.'' Separately, DZ Bank AG cut its price estimate for Heidelberger Druck by 29 percent to 10 euros and confirmed its ``sell'' recommendation.
On Friday the company announced that it planned on cutting 500 jobs and that preliminary sales results for the first quarter were 640 and 660 million Euro down from 742 million Euro a year ago.
In the past year the company completed a stock buyback. The stock they bought now trades for a third of the average purchase price. That's got to hurt.