Piper Jaffray Raises Estimates on Wintrust Financial (WTFC) Ahead of GE Deal

Piper Jaffray reiterated a Neutral rating on Wintrust Financial (NASDAQ: WTFC), and raised the price target to $53.00 (from $52.00), following the company's 2Q. WTFC reported results in-line with estimates. However, Piper Jaffray raised 2017 and 2018 operating EPS estimates to $3.79 and $4.07 (from $3.70 / $4.00) to reflect expected accretion from WTFC's pending GE restaurant franchise finance portfolio acquisition.

Analyst Nathan Race commented, "Earnings this quarter were in-line with our above consensus estimate; however, we raise our 2017E / 2018E operating EPS estimates to $3.79 / $4.07 (from $3.70 / $4.00) to reflect expected accretion from WTFC's pending GE restaurant franchise finance portfolio acquisition. Our target moves to $53 (from $52) based on 14x (unchanged) our increased 2017E EPS. We remain Neutral as we believe WTFC's two-pronged, above-average growth is balanced by its lower profitability profile relative to peers & reflected in its current valuation of 14.1x 2017E EPS (vs. peers at 13.5x). We would like to see additional and consistent operating leverage improvement from here in order to get more constructive."

For an analyst ratings summary and ratings history on Wintrust Financial click here. For more ratings news on Wintrust Financial click here.

Shares of Wintrust Financial closed at $52.67 yesterday.

You May Also Be Interested In

• Fiserv (FI) PT Raised to $175 at TD Cowen
• Verona Pharma (VRNA) PT Raised to $34 at BTIG
• JetBlue Airways (JBLU) PT Lowered to $6 at TD Cowen