I had this written this up ahead of the bell this morning and forgot to hit publish!  These things happen on Monday mornings.. Anyway, Citi reiterated its Buy rating on Veeco Instruments (VECO) and its $53 price target this morning.  Hat tip to Street Insider for the analyst comment.

“Increasing estimates” F2010 EPS from $3.56 to $3.84 (Street $3.58), F2011 from $3.26 to $4.11 (Street $3.78) and F2012 from $1.69 to $3.39 as our prior work has indicated MOCVD demand will require 800-1000 tools/yr through 2013…We like the setup and see strong potential for a move back toward mid to high $40’s on this report given record short interest (10MM shares or ~1/4 of the entire float).”

Shares of VECO were up nearly 5% heading into its earnings report tonight which I’ll post about in just a few minutes.  They reported blowout results and shares are up another 5% in after hours trading.

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