UPDATE: JP Morgan Raises Target to $65 on Gilead Sciences

JP Morgan maintains its Overweight rating on Gilead Sciences

and raises its price target to $65, up $10, following 4Q11 call takeaways. JP Morgan notes, "In our view, near-term clinical events in hep C (and HIV) were expected to dominate the discussion over 4Q results or guidance and this was clearly the case on the call. Specifically, the highlight was GS-7977 data from ELECTRON that will be presented at the CROI meeting (March 5-8; Seattle). '7977 + RBV in GT1 hep C patients showed a 100% RVR rate in ~35 patients (10 nulls, 25 naives), which is simply striking. ...We have to wait for SVR4 / 12 data, but initial RVR data for ‘7977 is very competitive in GT1 patients, the largest (70%) population in this category. We've doubled our ‘7977 forecasts in 2015 and 2016 ($0.8B to $1.6B; $1.5B to $3.0B)," GILD closed at $49.31 a share on Thursday.