Merrill Again

Now why would Merrill make their analysts put buy or sell signals on a certain percentage of stocks they cover. First of all, it makes no sense. During the height of the credit crises we just went through, there was no way a banking analyst could have had buy recommendations on 70 % of all the banks he covered. In the same sense, in a hot and growing sector like the agriculture sector maybe only 10% of stocks deserve to have a sell signal--yet now he must have 30% sell signals.

The word around the street is that by having more sell signals, it will cause more trading and therefore more commissions for Merrill and their brokers.

Way to go Merrill Lynch!