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Market Preview: Halfway to May

Written by: Michael Baron 04/16/12 - 9:12 PM EDT
Tickers in this article: GS RIMM ^DJI ^GSPC ^IXIC INTC AAPL

Goldman shares have gained more than 25% so far in 2012, but the stock is still well off a 52-week high of $156.10 dating back to last April. The firm's Wall Street brethren on the sell side are fairly skeptical with 17 of the 29 analysts covering the stock at either hold (16) or underperform (1), though the median 12-month price target of $145 implies potential upside of 23% from Monday's close at $117.73.

With a forward price-to-earnings multiple of 8.64X, Goldman is still more expensive than rival Morgan Stanley(MS) , which trades at 7.57X next year's earnings estimate. Morgan's exposure to Europe has been a drag on the stock.

Although Goldman beat the average analysts' profit view last time around, it missed in the two preceding quarters. It's also worth noting that the consensus revenue estimate is 20% below last year's reported first-quarter total of $11.89 billion.

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Goldman watchers will be looking to see if the firm's clients have boosted their risk tolerance and boosted their "willingness to transact," a lack of which CEO Lloyd Blankfein lamented last quarter. Expect the conference call to include a few questions on customer reaction to the now infamous Greg Smith New York Times op-ed where the former Goldman employee alleged he witnesses clients referred to a "muppets."

Check out TheStreet's quote page for Goldman Sachs for year-to-date share performance, analyst ratings, earnings estimates and much more.

Other companies reporting Tuesday morning include Comerica(CMA) , Forest Laboratories(FRX) , McMoran Exploration(MMR) , Northern Trust(NTRS) , Omnicom Group(OMC) , State Street(STT) , TD Ameritrade(AMTD) , U.S. Bancorp(USB) , and W.W. Grainger(GWW) .

The late roster features Cree(CREE) , Intuitive Surgical(ISRG) , Seagate Technology(STX) , Stryker(SYK) , United Rentals(URI) , and Yahoo!(YHOO) .

The economic calendar on Tuesday features housing starts and building permits for March at 8:30 a.m. ET; and industrial production and capacity utilization for March at 9:55 a.m. ET.