Shares of BlackBerry smart phone maker Research In Motion Ltd. rose Thursday after a Goldman Sachs analyst said she would buy the stock in advance of its fiscal fourth-quarter report, which is scheduled for April 2.
RIM shares rose $1.89, or 4.6 percent, to $44.87 in afternoon trading.
In a note to clients, Goldman analyst Simona Jankowski kept her "Buy" rating and $57 price target for the stock, predicting RIM will meet fourth-quarter and first-quarter guidance — something she thinks will help its shares.
The BlackBerry maker said in February that its fourth-quarter earnings will likely come in at the low end of its forecast range, which had called for 83 cents to 91 cents per share.
The company also predicted then that revenue would be at or near the midpoint of its earlier projection, which was for $3.3 billion to $3.5 billion.
Analysts polled by Thomson Reuters are expecting a profit of 85 cents per share on $3.42 billion in revenue; Jankowski expects 84 cents per share on $3.42 billion in revenue.
Jankowski thinks RIM's outlook will call for a sequential gross margin improvement in the first quarter, and said that checks make her increasingly confident about her estimates for the period. Jankowski expects a first-quarter profit of 83 cents per share on $3.36 billion in revenue.
She does expect a slowdown in April, saying the checks indicate Verizon Wireless will end a "buy one get one free" BlackBerry promotion at the end of March. She thinks that promotions surrounding Mother's Day and graduations will help sales, though.