Global Hunter Securities Has Reduce Rating On Transocean Ltd. (RIG)

Global Hunter Securities has a Reduce rating and a $72 price target on shares of Transocean Ltd.

. In a note to investors, Global writes, "Yesterday AMC, RIG released its quarterly fleet status report. Increased downtime offset a handful of non-headline worthy contracts, with most of the report in line with expectations. The impact has us reducing our 1Q11 and 2011 EPS estimates by 8c and 7c to 69c, and $4.80, respectively (consensus: 85c and $5.63)." Global goes on to say, "Fairly uneventful overall. The incremental downtime is expected with the quarter-ending report, so not a shocker, nor is the continued near-term availability of UD and deepwater rigs. We have no idea how consensus can be so high and expect downward revisions prior and post quarter. As investors shift towards valuing these companies off 2013-2014 earnings to account for oncoming capacity, we continue to favor Atwood (ATW;$42.62; Buy; $49 PT) and Ensco (ESV; $56.46; Accumulate; $61 PT) given the likely earnings growth, while RIG and Diamond (DO; $75.69; Neutral; $69 PT) lag behind as newbuild additions do little to offset declining earnings power from legacy assets." Shares of RIG are down $2.53 in Friday trading to $75.46, a loss of 3.2%.