Wells Fargo Maintains Market Perform on Pulte Group (PHM)

Wells Fargo is out with its report today on Pulte Group PHM, maintaining Market Perform.

In a note to clients, Wells Fargo writes, "On 3/8 we hosted investor meetings in Boston with PHM CEO Richard Dugas, CFO Roger Cregg and VP Jim Zeumer. Management appears more upbeat about field trends (especially traffic & traffic quality). PHM is intends to boost its relatively low gross margin through more efficient construction practices but we still expect GMs to trail peers in 2011. We are raising our order estimates for Q1 to -10% from -18% (- 26% apples-to-apples for a difference in order count methodology) based on the company's -7% two-month order track; we adjusted 2011E EPS fractionally (-$0.36 from $0.35). Our valuation range and our Market Perform rating are unchanged."

At the time of posting, shares of PHM were trading pre-market at $7.13, up 0.56% from Tuesday's close.