Zacks Analyst Blog Highlights: Progressive Corp., Allstate Corp., Infinity Property and Casualty Corp., State Auto Financial Corp. And Duke Energy Corp.

Zacks.com announces the list of stocks featured in the Analyst Blog. Every day the Zacks Equity Research analysts discuss the latest news and events impacting stocks and the financial markets. Stocks recently featured in the blog include: Progressive Corp. (NYSE: PGR), Allstate Corp. (NYSE: ALL), Infinity Property and Casualty Corp. (Nasdaq: IPCC), State Auto Financial Corp. (Nasdaq: STFC) and Duke Energy Corp. (NYSE: DUK).

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Here are highlights from Tuesday's Analyst Blog:

Fitch Cuts Progressive

Fitch Ratings downgraded Progressive Corp. (NYSE: PGR) but not because of a deterioration of the company's financial profile. Interestingly, the action was the result of a change in the agency's rating criteria.

Fitch cut Progressive's Issuer Default Rating (IDR) to 'A+' from 'AA-' and Senior debt ratings to 'A' from 'A+'. However, the outlook assigned for all ratings is stable. The agency increased weightage on Progressive's capital strength by focusing more on its estimated leverage ratios and its monoline character.

According to Fitch, Progressive has high net premiums written to surplus and net leverage ratios compared to its peers, and this exposes its capital to unanticipated pricing errors. Additionally, the company maintains an "autos-only" policy and does not provide any other form of insurance. This monoline nature exposes the company to the specific risks of the auto industry.

However, Progressive's industry leading position, strong risk-based capital ratios, underwriting margins and stability were also recognized by Fitch.

Progressive competes with some of the industry leaders such as GEICO, State Farm and Allstate Corp. (NYSE: ALL). While Progressive focuses only on auto insurance policy, these competitors also sell non-auto forms of insurance.

The recession has curtailed consumers' ability to purchase automobile insurance policies, thereby hurting balance sheets of auto insurance providers such as Progressive, Allstate, Infinity Property and Casualty Corp. (Nasdaq: IPCC) and State Auto Financial Corp. (Nasdaq: STFC). However, we believe that the recent rebound should bring some relief to these companies.

Duke Energy Goes Green

Duke Energy Corp. (NYSE: DUK) recently signed an agreement with Sun Edison and will buy electricity generated at the privately held company's solar farm at Davidson County in North Carolina. The 16.1MW facility is touted as the largest photovoltaic solar farm in the U.S.

The solar farm will serve dual purposes for Duke. It will add 16.1MW of annual capacity to its kitty. Secondly, it will go green. According to the company's estimates, the same amount of electricity produced from fossil fuels would have emitted 32.3 million pounds of carbon dioxide annually. Duke Energy would then be required to offset it by spending more on carbon credits following the American Clean Energy and Security Act.

The act stipulates stringent caps against carbon dioxide emissions. Duke Energy expects the facility to be operational by December 2010.

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