UPDATE: Bank of America Upgrades MKS Instruments to Buy on Early Cyclical Leverage

Bank of America upgraded MKS Instruments, Inc.

from Underperform to Buy and raises the price objective from $21.00 to $32.00. Bank of America noted, "MKSI is the largest supplier of sub-systems to the semiconductor equipment OEM's (such as AMAT, LRCX, etc). MKSI gets high revenue growth leverage early in the cycle as OEM's (original equipment manufacturers) rebuild inventory to support shipments. While we don't anticipate MKSI's OEM customers seeing shipment growth until C2H13, this would imply that the inventory replenishment could occur as early as 2Q13, i.e. 1Q13 could be the trough quarter for revenue and earnings." MKS Instruments closed at $26.00 on Monday.