AstraZeneca upgrade, Life Storage downgrade and Frontier Group coverage resumption among today's top calls on Wall Street Institutional investors and professional traders rely on The Fly to learn which companies the best analysts on Wall Street are saying to buy and sell.
Research analysts at Wall Street's largest banks issue recommendations on whether a stock should be bought, held, or sold. The Fly's team of financial market experts scours hundreds of research notes daily to uncover the best trading ideas. Check out today's top analyst calls from around Wall Street, compiled by The Fly.
Top 5 Upgrades:
- Argus analyst Jasper Hellweg upgraded AstraZeneca (AZN) to Buy from Hold with a $75 price target. The analyst cited the company having received a range of new product approvals in recent months, including for multiple oncology drugs and a treatment for myasthenia gravis.
- Wells Fargo analyst Dori Kesten upgraded Host Hotels (HST) to Overweight from Equal Weight with a price target of $21, up from $20. Among the full-service lodging REITs, Host Hotels has among the smallest exposures to leisure and among the largest exposures to group, the segments the analyst expects to face the greatest and smallest relative headwinds from a near-term recession, respectively.
- Wells Fargo analyst Dori Kesten upgraded Park Hotels & Resorts (PK) to Overweight from Equal Weight with a price target of $17, down from $20. Park Hotels & Resorts does have a greater exposure to leisure demand than the lodging REIT average, but in one of its core markets - Honolulu - the analyst believes a leisure tailwind exists in the return of travelers from Japan, and its group exposure is 1000bps greater than the lodging REIT average, a positive in Kesten's view.
- Wells Fargo analyst Dori Kesten upgraded Apple Hospitality REIT (APLE) to Equal Weight from Underweight with a price target of $17, up from $16. The analyst noted Apple Hospitality REIT has among the smaller exposures to leisure demand at 25% of total demand versus the lodging REITs at 31%, and is most heavily weighted among the Upscale chain scale, not the high/low end where Kesten expects the greatest headwinds to occur.
- Piper Sandler analyst Jason Bednar upgraded Envista (NVST) to Overweight from Neutral with a price target of $46, up from $40. The analyst came away from a recent meeting with management "incrementally comfortable with the outlook for key tenets" of Envista's business.
Top 5 Downgrades:
- Evercore ISI analyst Steve Sakwa downgraded Life Storage (LSI) to In Line from Outperform with a price target of $138, down from $139. The analyst cited valuation for the downgrade following the stock's "strong outperformance over the past 30 days."
- Wells Fargo analyst Dori Kesten downgraded Choice Hotels (CHH) to Underweight from Equal Weight with a price target of $123, down from $130. Among the lodging C-Corps, Choice has the largest exposure to leisure demand at an estimated 60% of total demand, and the smallest exposure to group demand, as well as having the largest exposure to lower end hotels, Kesten noted. The analyst also downgraded Hersha Hospitality (HT), DiamondRock Hospitality (DRH) and Pebblebrook Hotel (PEB) to Equal Weight from Overweight.
- Consumer Edge analyst Connor Rattigan downgraded Hain Celestial (HAIN) to Equal Weight from Overweight with a price target of $23, down from $30, after the company preannounced on August 9 and issued updated guidance that he says implies "a significantly worsening operating environment in a short period of time."
- KeyBanc analyst Aleksey Yefremov downgraded Dow Inc. (DOW), LyondellBasell (LYB) and Westlake (WLK) to Underweight from Sector Weight with price targets of $45, $73 and $90, respectively. The analyst expects to see continued downside in U.S. polyethylene prices and his margin assumptions also moved lower to reflect higher natural gas/ethane costs.
- KeyBanc analyst Matthew Mishan downgraded Cooper Companies (COO) to Sector Weight from Overweight without a price target. The analyst is less confident in the sustainability of recent growth trends for CooperVision into fiscal 2023 and thinks consensus estimates are likely moving lower on currency moves and interest rates.
Top 5 Initiations:
- Citi analyst Stephen Trent resumed coverage of Frontier Group (ULCC) with a Buy rating and $20 price target. Ongoing fuel price declines, further improvements in non-ticket revenue and clearer indications of easing U.S. inflation "screen as potential positive catalysts for the shares," Trent told investors in a research note.
- Cantor Fitzgerald analyst Brett Knoblauch initiated coverage of Mondee (MOND) with an Overweight rating and $15 price target. Mondee operates a global distribution system, or GDS, that offers superior features relative to incumbents GDSs and is taking share in the "large and growing" $1T assisted travel industry, Knoblauch argued.
- BofA analyst Geoff Meacham initiated coverage of IGM Biosciences (IGMS) with a Buy rating and $34 price target ahead of a phase 2 update expected in the second half of this year or early 2023 for the company's lead program, imvotamab.
- BofA analyst Jason Gerberry initiated coverage of Xenon Pharmaceuticals (XENE) with a Buy rating and $48 price target. The company's XEN1101 is "uniquely differentiated" from other epilepsy drugs on ease of use, novel MOA and potent efficacy, the analyst told investors in a research note.
- Roth Capital analyst John White initiated coverage of Battalion Oil (BATL) with a Buy rating and $28 price target. The analyst believe Battalion Oil presents a compelling investment opportunity for several reasons, including a very strong Finding and Development Costs record, compelling relative valuation compared to our Small Capitalization Oil Weighted peer group and Permian Basin-focused peer group, his estimate of debt reduction in 2023, and a reduction in operating costs, primarily due to lower Gathering costs, set to occur in 2023.
Symbols:
AZN PK HST APLE NVST LSI CHH HAIN HT DRH PEB COO ULCC MOND IGMS XENE BATL DOW LYB WLK Keywords: analyst, analyst calls, upgrades, downgrades, initiations, research, wall street