Nokia: Credit Suisse Boosts Target, Ests; Bullish On N97

What is the deal with Nokia (NOK) and smart phones? Here we have the world’s largest cell phone producer - by a wide margin - and it can’t find a carrier partner in the U.S. for their new top-of-the-line smart phone, which features one of the company’s usual memorable names: the N97 . That doesn’t bother Kulbinder Garcha: the Credit Suisse analyst today repeated his Outperform rating on the stock, lifting his price target to 14 Euros, from 12 Euros. He also boosted his 2010 EPS estimate to 1.10 Euros per share, from 1.00 Euros. In his note, Garcha specifically looks at the N97 and other Nokia smart phones. He finds that the gross profit per unit of its newer models is about twice that of its existing smart phone portfolio. On the other hand, he also notes that he did a comparison of four key new smartphones, and ranked them on 10 key metrics. The highest ranked, with a score of 91/100, was the Apple (AAPL) iPhone. That was followed by the Palm (PALM) Pre ... (link)