For Immediate Release

Chicago, IL – February 18, 2010 – 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: Toyota Motor (TM), Joy Global (JOYG), Bucyrus (BUCY), Parker Hannifin (PH) and Rockwell Automation (ROK).

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Here are highlights from Wednesday’s Analyst Blog:

Corolla to Join Toyota Recall

After the popular 2010 Prius hybrid by Toyota Motor (TM), it appears to be Corolla’s turn to face a recall, this time due to power-steering problems. The automaker has received about 100 complaints related to the problem and is discussing the matter with National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) to see if a formal investigation is warranted.

Last week, Toyota expanded its global recall to 437,000 units (223,000 units in Japan, 156,000 in the U.S., 53,000 in Japan and 5,000 in other nations) of its popular 2010 Prius hybrid and other hybrids such as the Lexus HS250h sedan, sold in the U.S. and Japan, and the Sai, sold only in Japan. The recall addressed a problem related to braking system.

The recall of hybrids comes on top of a global recall of 8.1 million vehicles related to faulty accelerator gas pedals and slipping floor mats. About 4.45 million vehicles (2.21 million units in the U.S., 270,000 in Canada, 1.71 million in Europe, 75,552 in China and 180,000 in other nations) have been recalled for faulty gas pedals and 5.75 million vehicles (5.35 million units in the U.S. and 400,000 in Canada) for slipping floor mats. Of this, about 2.1 million vehicles have both pedal and floor mat related problems.

Akio Toyoda, the President of Toyota, has revealed that the company would include a brake-override system in all its future models worldwide, which would stop supplying power to the engine when the accelerator and brake pedals are applied at the same time. This would add a measure of safety against the sticking-gas pedal problems.

Industrial Production Recovering

By stage of processing, the nation is doing well on the crude goods front, with output running at 85.9% of capacity, sharply higher than the 81.5% level of a year ago, and up from 85.2% in December and 84.8% in November. It is within spitting distance of the long-term average of 86.5%. This is very good news for the suppliers of industrial equipment to crude goods producers.

Crude goods are basically commodities. Thus, consider this to be a green-light report for firms like Joy Global (JOYG) and Bucyrus (BUCY).

It is the later stages of production where the shutdowns have been most acute. In semi-finished goods (for example steel, whereas iron ore would be a crude good), plants are only running at 69.4% of capacity. While that is up from 69.0% in December and 68.1% in November, it is still below both the 69.7% level of a year ago and well below the 81.6% long-term average.

Finished goods capacity utilization is doing only a little bit better, rising to 70.1% in January from 70.1% in December and 69.8% in November. A year ago it was running at 68.5%, and its long-term average is 77.5%. While the trends are in the right direction, the absolute level is still abysmal.

If a factory has 10 lathes and three of them are just sitting there gathering dust, the lathe salesman is not going to get many new orders. Thus, firms selling equipment to factories that produce finished and semi-finished goods factories, like Parker Hannifin (PH) and Rockwell Automation (ROK) are starting to see things move in the right direction, but may have a bit longer to wait for the orders to actually come through. Still, the trends are very much in the right direction, so investors might want to get ahead of the curve on these names.

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