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Broker Roundup Pt 1 including Royal Bank of Scotland, BP, Anglo American, Shell, PV Crystalox, Debenhams.

Last updated: 08:32 24 Oct 2011 EDT, First published: 07:32 24 Oct 2011 EDT

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Credit Suisse analysts will be looking at the performance of Royal Bank of Scotland's (LON:RBS) investment arm GBM when the group reports its third quarter results on November 4 this year.

"We are expecting clean revenues to decline by 49 per cent quarter on quarter to £785 million in Q3 2011 estimates compared with £1,550 mln in Q2 2011 and £2,380mln in Q1 2011," said Credit Suisse today, which rates the stock 'neutral' targeting a price of 22 pence (current price: 24.92 pence).

"More acute than in some of the other investment banks, we estimate a cost to income ratio will significantly increase to 120 per cent in Q3 2011 pushing the full year cost to income ratio up to around 75 per cent," it said. GBM stands for Global Banking and Markets.

Credit Suisse said that given this pressure and the challenging environment, it expected to hear more details in terms of restructuring, and noted that the press had recently suggested that RBS may look to scale back activities more aggressively.

Meanwhile, Citigroup rates oil major BP (LON:BP.) as 'neutral' targeting a price of 425 pence and said last week was a good one for the firm with three key announcements including the financial settlement with Anadarko and the award of the firm's first drilling permit in the Gulf of Mexico.

Citigroup analyst Alastair Syme also cited an apparent warming of relations with Russian TNK partners that had cooled earlier this year.

But he added that one big risk remained, namely the financial impact of fines and penalties arising from the Gulf spill, which are due to be decided at the multi-jurisdiction proceedings in New Orleans, which start in February next year or before that if parties can settle.

"We believe that investors should not be complacent on this issue, a position that we feel the market has migrated to following BP’s settlements with Anadarko, Mitsui and Weatherford."

Sticking with the oil and gas theme, Evolution Securities said that a number of firms would be reporting third quarter results this week, including BP (LON:BP.), Shell (LON:RDSB), BG Group (LON:BG.) and Total (LON:TTA).

However, the broker said the numbers were "unlikely to excite" as the firm's  and consensus estimates indicated flat to slightly down performances relative to the second quarter.

It also noted however that share price performances over the last month suggested that investors were buying into the recovery stories in Eni (up 30 per cent) and Total (up 23 per cent) – the two best performing international oil companies.

Anglo American (LON:AAL) caught the attention of analysts at Goldman Sachs today, which targets a price of 4250 pence for the stock.

Goldman notes today's coverage in The Financial Times saying that the forced sale of 49 percent of certain of the firm's Chilean assets (Anglo American Sur) to Codelco - the Chilean state-owned copper producer -  via the pre-existing option agreement would trigger a capital gains tax bill of around $900 million.

Last week, Codelco said it planned to exercise an option to buy just less than half of certain of Anglo's copper assets in Chile and that it had already raised the US$6.75 billion needed to do the deal.

"This would seem to be a case of insult after injury if the reported tax situation is correct. We estimate that a 49 per cent share at $6.5 billion undervalues the Sur assets, given our long-term outlook for copper and the expandability of Los Bronces and the prospectivity of the Los Sulfatos and San Enrique Monolito deposits.

"The loss of the assets would also have the dual negative of cutting Anglo’s immediate term growth outlook and increasing the proportional exposure to South African earnings," said Goldman.

Meanwhile, the financial giant rates PV Crystalox (LON:PVCS) a 'sell' after the solar technology firm lowered its full-year guidance this morning in a pre-released management statement.

Goldman said as it highlighted in a recent clean energy report, it continues to see a difficult macro environment and structural oversupply negatively impacting high cost solar producers in Europe. Restructuring and consolidation of uneconomic capacities is likely to be a key theme through the second half of this year and in 2012, it said.

Retailer Debenhams (LON:DEB) is rated 'neutral' by UBS, which entitles a note on the stock: "A barren year ahead".

Analyst Adam Cochrane said the firm beat expectations for the full year as costs came in slightly better than expected but said there was "little on the horizon" for full year 2012.

"With a lack of UK new space, management focus remains on cash gross margin, store refits, internet growth and international franchising. There is a risk that FY12 is a 'lost year' as profits stagnate in a tough UK environment and investor focus moves to how big the potential second half buyback is likely to be and when it might be announced."

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