BUZZ-Top of the Street: Danone, Lufthansa, InterContinental Hotels, Sika

A round-up of notable broker activity this morning from Europe's top-ranked* analysts:

** Davy raises Danone to "outperform" saying "new-Danone" is a more disciplined, results-driven and adaptive organization

** SocGen cuts Lufthansa to "hold" after profit warning, says it was understood Lufthansa would face stiffer competition but the impact exceeded expectations

** InterContinental Hotels: Barclays downgrades to "under-weight" saying current valuation (peak PE) ignores the significant downside risks associated with a macro slowdown

** Barclays cuts HomeServe to "equal-weight", says positive outlook for the U.S. is still justified but largely reflected in the current share price

** VTB Capital downgrades Evraz to "hold" on fair valuation

** Credit Suisse downgrades Experian to "neutral" saying organic growth will slow in 2020, which will create a challenging environment for further re-rating

INITIATIONS AND REINSTATEMENTS

** SocGen initiates STMicroelectronics with "buy"

** Bank of America Merrill Lynch starts Cineworld Group with "underperform" saying long-term structural headwinds are "too strong to ignore"

** Deutsche Bank reinstates coverage of Sika with "buy" as it sees continued market outperformance and revenue growth above expectations

(*Analyst rankings from Thomson Reuters StarMine. Scale is from 1-star to 5-star with 5 being best. Analysts ranked on earnings accuracy as well as relative performance of recommendations over trailing 12-month & 24-month periods.)