While Fools should generally take the opinion of Wall Street with a grain of salt, it's not a bad idea to take a closer look at particularly stock-shaking upgrades and downgrades -- just in case their reasoning behind the call makes sense.
What: Shares of Google (GOOGL 1.27%) gained slightly this morning after Nomura Securities initiated coverage on the Internet search giant with a buy rating.
So what: Along with the buy rating, analyst Anthony DiClemente planted a price target of $1,300 on the stock, representing 13% worth of upside to yesterday's close. While value investors might be turned off by Google's strong share price over the past year, DiClemente believes there's more room to run given the strong operating momentum still working in its favor.
Now what: Nomura expects Google to post full-year EPS of $44.15 in 2013 and $53.68 in 2014.
"We believe that there are three key reasons to own Google: 1) Google's Android operating system is winning the mobile platform war, providing Google with a superior business model across services; 2) Google's monetization of the local ad market represents a material forward driver; and 3) growth in Google's media assets (Google Play, YouTube, Chromecast, and Google Fiber) bode well for media content-related revenue streams," noted DiClemente.
More importantly, with Google still trading at a forward P/E in the low 20s, there certainly seems like enough room to buy into those trends.
