Banking, finance, and taxes
Strong Synchrony Analyst Coverage a Long-Term Positive for GE
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The analyst quiet period for Synchrony Financial (NYSE: SYF) has now ended and analysts from the underwriting syndicate are out with mostly positive commentary on the credit card issuer. We did see some analyst calls that were less robust, and we also included many notes signaling other views and research that had been issued prior to the quiet period expiring.
To cover Synchrony Financial, there are implications here for General Electric Co. (NYSE: GE) that go above and beyond a traditional majority ownership stake that GE holds. Synchrony’s IPO range of $23 to $26 was met with a $23 pricing.
GE shares were weak after its own earnings and the Synchrony IPO failed to generate buzz. But now Synchrony shares have risen to $24.84 from the $23 pricing, and shares were up at $25.60 in Tuesday’s early trading.
The Synchrony Financial underwriters for its IPO of common stock recently announced that they partially exercised their option to purchase additional shares and purchased an additional 3,493,756 shares of common stock at the $23 price per share. General Electric will own approximately 84.6% of the stock after that point, until it spins the rest out to shareholders in 2015, and this means that Synchrony raised roughly $2.8 billion.
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24/7 Wall St. has tracked the initial analyst calls from the syndicate. The ratings and price targets were as follows:
Again, other research pieces have been seen prior to Tuesday morning. On Monday that Nomura started coverage with a Neutral rating.
At the end of July, we saw that Morningstar indicated that Synchrony sold itself to the public at close to a 50% discount to its true value, which could be closer to $36 per share. Also at the end of July came word that BTIG started coverage with a Buy rating and a $23 price target going into the IPO. In mid-August we saw that Fitch Ratings assigned a BBB- rating to Synchrony’s unsecured notes.
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GE shares were trading down $0.12 at $25.96 in morning trading on Tuesday. This stock has been stuck within 1% or so of the $26 handle for most of the past month, after recovering from $25 shortly after the Synchrony Financial IPO. A positive outlook for Synchrony is a positive for GE shareholders because it is just that much more that the holders will receive down the road. A less than positive reaction on a one-day period is not something that should interfere with long-term outlooks.
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