Stanford Research Downgrades Insituform: Buying Opportunity

Stanford Research downgraded Insituform (INSU) Tuesday from "Buy" to "Hold," a month to the day after recommending it in the first place. It seems Stanford (which is unrelated to the University, by the way) did not have the same reaction to the divestiture of the tunneling division that we did.

Of course, this bothers us not at all. According to the Motley Fool, Stanford is among the worst performing analyst groups, chalking up an accuracy rate of less than 38%. In other words, a monkey throwing darts would likely perform better. In fact, the fine gentlemen at Stanford Research have done us a big favor with their downgrade: INSU fell about 5% on the downgrade to $19 and change, about the level we first recommended it. So if you missed out on it last time around, you have another chance to get in at a great price. And if you presently hold shares (as your editor does), now would be a good time to add to your position.

Meanwhile, Insituform recently won the 2007 Innovative Product Award for its iPlus Composite product at the No-Dig Conference in San Diego, a major water infrastructure industry event. We remain confident in the rosy future for Insituform's core business, and pleased by the divestiture of the tunneling division.

INSU 1-yr chart