Friday's analyst upgrades and downgrades

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Inside the Market's roundup of some of today's key analyst actions. This file will be updated during the trading day. For breaking analyst actions prior to market open every day, read our Before the Bell morning report.

Analysts are hiking their price targets on Air Canada after the airline late Thursday upwardly revised its earnings expectations for the first quarter of this year.

Investors are bidding up the stock at full throttle. Shares are up about 23 per cent this afternoon on the TSX.

Canaccord Genuity analyst David Tyerman raised his price target on Air Canada to $10.50 (Canadian) from $10.25 and reiterated a "buy" rating. AltaCorp Capital Research analyst Chris Murray raised his target to $12 from $11 and maintained an "outperform" rating. TD Securities raised its target to $9 from $8.50 with a "speculative buy" rating.

Air Canada has been under pressure in recent months due to concerns about negative performance resulting from the recent slide in the Canadian dollar against the greenback. Back when it released its fourth-quarter results, it predicted that first-quarter EBITDAR (earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, amortization and impairment) would be $15-million to $30-million lower than already weak results in the first quarter of 2013, mostly because of the weak currency.

But it's looking like Air Canada has done better than expected. It now expects flat year-over-year EBITDAR in the first quarter. "This is still a soft result, but a surprisingly strong recovery from a sudden cost shock – the weak Canadian dollar," Mr. Tyerman said in a research note.

The airline attributed its upwardly revised performance outlook to higher-than-expected revenue as well as better expenses per available seat mile.

"We have benchmarked our Q1/14 results to management's guidance and raised our Q2/14 EBITDAR to a flat year-over-year performance (we still think the cost hit will be hard to offset in Q2/14). Accordingly, our 2014 EBITDAR forecast is roughly 4 per cent higher than previously forecast. The rest of our forecast horizon is minimally changed," said Mr. Tyerman.

AltaCorp's Mr. Murray noted the company expects a strong summer travel season based on forward bookings. He believes this is indicative that fares will remain strong and should continue to see ongoing improvement through the summer.

The mean price target for Air Canada as of Friday afternoon is $8.95, according to Thomson Reuters.

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Canaccord Genuity analyst Tony Lesiak upgraded Eldorado Gold Corp. to "buy" from "hold," believing that the recent underperformance in the share price makes a bet on the company's stock worth the risk.

Eldorado has underperformed its peers 6 per cent over the last month and 22 per cent so far this year. The weakness may be tied to upcoming elections in Greece and Turkey, where the company is trying to secure permits for projects, creating additional uncertainty as to their future, said Mr. Lesiak.

Even when excluding several projects that could be subject to permitting delays or cancellations from his net asset value calculations, Mr. Lesiak still finds that shares are trading at attractive valuations relative to peers.

"If we fully exclude higher risk assets Perama, Eastern Dragon, Certej, and Sapes, we estimate that ELD is trading at 0.77x NAV, at an 8 per cent discount to the group. If we further exclude the Kisladag expansion and Skouries (a severe outcome) from our analysis, the P/NAV increases to 1.07x, a 27 per cent premium.

"On a balance of probabilities, there appears to be a clear risk/reward opportunity," he said.

He trimmed his price target to $8.50 (Canadian) from $9.

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BMO Nesbitt Burns analyst Keith Bachman has raised his earnings per share estimates on Apple Inc. because of the company's aggressive share buybacks over the last few months.

He also nudged his price target up to $565 (U.S.), from $560, while reiterating an "outperform" rating.

But he cautions the Street consensus for revenues for the June quarter are too high. He projects revenues for that period of $36.6-billion, compared to the consensus of $38.6-billion.

"We continue to believe that AAPL's valuation is attractive relative to historical measures as well as relative to the S&P 500," Mr. Bachman said in a research note. "Based on changes in the multiple, we believe that the upside case is in the $635 range and the downside case is in the $470 range. We are raising our March quarter EPS estimate to $10.23 from $10.16 (consensus of $10.14). We are also raising our FY2014 EPS estimate to $41.59 from $41.36 (consensus of $42.75) and our FY2015 EPS estimate to $45.15 from $44.55 (consensus of $46.54)."

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In other analyst actions:

Desjardins Securities upgraded Kirkland Lake Gold to "hold" from "sell" and kept a $3.75 (Canadian) price target, citing recent share price depreciation.

Canaccord Genuity cut its price target on Hudson's Bay to $21.50 (Canadian) from $22.50 but kept a "buy" rating. Credit Suisse cut its target to $18 from $19 and kept a "neutral" rating, and TD Securities cut its target to $21 from $22 and reiterated a "buy" rating.

UBS upgraded Huntsman to "buy" from "neutral" and raised its price target to $32 (U.S.) from $24.

UBS upgraded Dynegy to "neutral" from "sell" and raised its price target to $25 (U.S.) from $18.

ISI Group downgraded Cobalt International Energy to "buy" from "strong buy" with a price target of $22.50 (U.S.).

Credit Suisse raised its price target on Anadarko Petroleum to $118 from $108 and reiterated an "outperform" rating. UBS raised its target on Anadarko to $110 from $100 and maintained a "buy" rating.

For more analyst actions, breaking investing news and analysis, follow Darcy Keith on Twitter at @eyeonequities