12:45 AM EDT, 05/10/2024 (MT Newswires) -- CFRA, an independent research provider, has provided MT Newswires with the following research alert. Analysts at CFRA have summarized their opinion as follows:

We raise our price target by $10 to $49, 13x our '25 EPS view, near peers but below DIOD's 3-year average (~14x) on lingering inventory headwinds across each of its end markets. Our lifted target reflects a conservative shift in focus to '25 from '24. We lower our '24 EPS view by $0.28 to $2.14 and lower '25's by $0.25 to $3.76. DIOD posts Q1 sales of $302M (-35% Y/Y) and EPS of $0.28 (-82%), just below consensus. Echoing bearish sentiment from CFRA's forensic accounting team in April, we see increasing risks to gross margin from rising levels of inventory, with total days up 15% Q/Q (59% Y/Y) to 184 and finished goods days up 37% (116% Y/Y) to 67. DIOD expects GM improvement from a mix shift towards Auto/Industrial (sales -6% Q/Q, -44% Y/Y), but we expect continued inventory headwinds in these markets (particularly industrial) to weigh on growth throughout '24, especially as DIOD's focus on Asia (75% of Q1 sales), where EVs have been more resilient, faces new risks from Chinese quotas for non-domestic supply.