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Investors like the look of those Google Inc. earnings, released after markets closed on Thursday. The shares rose Friday morning, putting them at a fresh 52-week high, and representing a gain of 123 per cent from their low in November.

This isn't surprising, given that Google topped expectations with a 27 per cent jump in earnings over last year and a 7 per cent gain in revenue.

"While there's obviously a lot of uncertainty about the pace of the economic recovery, we feel the worst of the recession is behind us," said Eric Schmidt, Google's chief executive during a conference call. "We're seeing lots of signs of that in all the industries that we pay attention to."

However, what is somewhat surprising is the enthusiasm among analysts. Admittedly, these folks have not been exactly downbeat on Google. According to Bloomberg, 36 of the 42 analysts who follow the stock currently have "buy" recommendations on it. Just five analysts have "hold" recommendations and only one has a "sell" (and that analyst hasn't updated his view on the stock since mid-November, an eon ago).

However, analysts are now tripping over themselves with higher target prices on Google. Analysts at Bank of America, Deutsche Bank, RBC Dominion Securities, UBS, JPMorgan Chase & Co. and Canaccord Adams have raised their target prices by as much as 25 per cent.

Jeff Rath, the analyst at Canaccord Adams, raised his target price to $700 from $560 - implying a price-to-earnings ratio of 23.3, based on his estimated 2010 earnings.

Mr. Rath explains: "Improved YouTube monetization appears to be ramping materially, supporting the notion that a second product cycle may be about to begin in order to sustain Google's high level of growth, as its accumulation of search share begins to wane."

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