UPDATE: FBN Securities Reiterates Sector Perform Rating, Lowers PT on Fusion io

In a report published Friday, FBN Securities reiterated its Sector Perform rating on Fusion io (NASDAQ: FIO), but lowered its price target from $30.00 to $28.00.FBN Securities noted, “Retain Sector Perform/lower PT to $28. We retain our Sector Perform rating on FIO but trim our PT from $30 to $28 to reflect a more challenging IT spending environment. FIO beat expectations for FQ1/Sept. mostly due to the ‘pull-in' of a ~$10M deal from one of its key customers, so it is guiding for flattish growth Q/Q in FQ2/Dec., and this guidance is causing the stock to exhibit weakness today. Frankly, the market reaction reminds us of MLNX, as MLNX reported abnormally high revenue in CQ3 as the introduction of a new customer (Polywell) in CQ3 added much to revenue to MLNX that quarter and caused a weaker Q/Q guidance for CQ4, and we think that this reaction was not rational. So, if anything, we are warming up to FIO here at lower levels. We believe that FIO is by far the most investable pure play in SSDs/PCIe SSDs after the recent challenges at OCZ and STEC. However, the sudden deterioration in spending on technology that many have noted, particularly since the second half of September, is causing us to still be patient on this equity.”Fusion io closed on Thursday at $27.32.