The following is a list of the S&P 500 firms where the analysts have been cutting their expectations for the current fiscal year the most over the last month. Most likely these firms reported disappointing earnings or gave negative guidance on their conference calls.
Historically, you have not wanted to be invested in companies where the analysts who follow them most closely see the earnings prospects diminishing. Also, estimates in motion tend to remain in motion. The first bit of bad news is rarely the last (the cockroach theory). This means that the current expectations, even though down from last month, are probably still to high for these firms.
To weed out anomalies, only those firms that are currently expected to earn more than $0.50 in 2009 are included and only those firms where there are a minimum of three estimates in the system.
If you have these stocks in your portfolio, you might want to reconsider holding on to them.
| Company | Ticker | 2009 Zacks Consensus |
4-Week % Change |
Positive Revisions |
Negative Revisions |
EPS Growth |
P/E |
| Harley-Davidson | HOG | $0.88 | -38.80% | 0 | 11 | -68.29% | 26.86 |
| Peabody Energy | BTU | $1.44 | -34.05% | 1 | 9 | -60.26% | 24.71 |
| Parker Hannifin | PH | $1.62 | -32.28% | 0 | 13 | -48.32% | 30.14 |
| Cincinnati Finl | CINF | $1.17 | -29.90% | 0 | 4 | -44.19% | 21.01 |
| Sunoco Inc | SUN | $1.56 | -28.81% | 0 | 7 | -79.15% | 16.76 |
| Host Hotel&Rsrt | HST | $0.50 | -26.61% | 0 | 9 | -71.07% | 21.58 |
| Pnc Finl Svc Cp | PNC | $2.03 | -25.94% | 0 | 12 | -44.97% | 21.84 |
| Genzyme-General | GENZ | $2.19 | -22.52% | 1 | 5 | -37.10% | 22.02 |
| Aetna Inc-New | AET | $2.92 | -17.67% | 1 | 15 | -25.80% | 9.32 |
| Safeway Inc | SWY | $1.75 | -16.43% | 0 | 10 | -20.72% | 10.58 |
| Manitowoc Inc | MTW | $0.52 | -16.32% | 1 | 6 | -81.91% | 13.2 |
| Assurant Inc | AIZ | $4.07 | -15.27% | 0 | 11 | -24.08% | 6.71 |
| Bb&T Corp | BBT | $1.14 | -15.17% | 7 | 16 | -54.14% | 22.61 |
| Smith Intl | SII | $1.07 | -14.73% | 2 | 11 | -71.82% | 24.43 |
| Qlogic Corp | QLGC | $0.59 | -14.27% | 0 | 10 | -43.74% | 23.09 |
| Starwood Hotels | HOT | $0.67 | -14.09% | 1 | 15 | -69.38% | 44.26 |
| Supervalu Inc | SVU | $2.01 | -12.23% | 0 | 6 | -30.45% | 7.63 |
| Expeditors Intl | EXPD | $1.15 | -11.06% | 0 | 12 | -16.00% | 28.67 |
| Consol Energy | CNX | $3.32 | -10.98% | 1 | 13 | 38.29% | 11.49 |
| Abercrombie | ANF | $0.90 | -10.41% | 1 | 16 | -73.16% | 36.38 |
| Pitney Bowes In | PBI | $2.22 | -10.38% | 0 | 2 | -20.26% | 10.1 |
| Bj Services | BJS | $0.70 | -10.35% | 0 | 12 | -65.96% | 20.29 |
| Frontier Commun | FTR | $0.53 | -9.49% | 0 | 11 | -8.37% | 13.3 |
| Lexmark Intl | LXK | $2.36 | -9.44% | 1 | 8 | -33.63% | 7.07 |
| Marriott Intl-A | MAR | $0.83 | -9.30% | 2 | 14 | -45.07% | 30.59 |
| Snap-On Inc | SNA | $2.70 | -9.17% | 0 | 3 | -33.66% | 14.31 |
| Dover Corp | DOV | $1.80 | -8.67% | 0 | 8 | -50.86% | 19.05 |
| Marathon Oil Cp | MRO | $2.06 | -8.46% | 2 | 8 | -68.23% | 14.91 |
| Meredith Corp | MDP | $1.81 | -8.42% | 0 | 4 | -11.03% | 15.39 |
| Symantec Corp | SYMC | $1.26 | -8.25% | 0 | 10 | -13.32% | 12.34 |
| Utd Parcel Srvc | UPS | $2.16 | -8.17% | 0 | 16 | -38.27% | 25.04 |
| Eqt Corp | EQT | $1.35 | -8.17% | 0 | 7 | -32.39% | 29.26 |
