Goldman Sees Early X-mas for GE

FAIRFIELD, Conn. (TheStreet) -- General Electric (GE) investors have reason to be bullish going into December, according to a recent report from Goldman Sachs.

Goldman analyst Terry Darling, who has had a buy on GE since July 30, wrote in a report published Wednesday that two analyst events involving the company's financial services unit -- a webcast set on Dec. 8 and the annual outlook meeting for the business on Dec. 15 -- could provide catalysts for a GE rally.

GE has held three conference calls with investors in the past year to provide details about the performance of the financial services unit, GE Capital Services (referred to as GECS in the chart below from Goldman), whose health has been a great source of concern over the past two years.

Goldman's research shows GE's stock has generally performed well during the week leading up to the conference calls, on the day of the calls, and during the week after the calls. Overall, GE shares were up 9.4% from Dec. 1, 2008, the day before the first of these calls, through yesterday. The S&P 500 is up 26% during the same time period. The stock has done well in November, rising more than 10 percent through Wednesday's session since closing at $14.47 on Nov. 2.

GE has said it wants to shrink its financial unit, in an effort to trade at a price to earnings multiple afforded industrial companies like United Technologies (UTX)and Caterpillar (cat) as opposed to large financials like Citigroup (C), Bank of America (BAC) and Wells Fargo (WFC).

-- Written by Dan Freed in New York.

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