Citizens Reiterates Market Perform Rating on Morgan Stanley (MS) After Q3 Beat

Citizens analyst Brian McKenna reiterated a Market Perform rating and {REMOVEPT} price target on Morgan Stanley (NYSE: MS).

The analyst commented, "we believe the market directionally appreciated the results would be strong with potential for outperformance (and investors we spoke with heading in generally anticipated a solid beat to consensus), but we thought the bigger drivers of the stock on the day would be if the company could beat bogeys on several other key drivers, including delivering in: 1) GWM NII - where management had guided to approximately flat sequential results in the third quarter - which we think was the bogey, but it actually delivered 4% sequential growth; 2) GWM NNA - where we had believed based on investor conversations that if the company could get into the zip code of $75B (just below 4.6% NNA rate), that would be considered good, and anything above that would be very good - and it produced at $81B (5% NNA rate) - very good; and 3) while we were better than the Street on the comp ratio, we thought even more leverage to our model could exist here as an upside EPS driver (supported by stronger revenues and also a better revenue outlook than from earlier in the year where accruals started), which the company showcased with a firmwide comp ratio of 40.8% vs. our model of 43.1%."

For an analyst ratings summary and ratings history on Morgan Stanley click here. For more ratings news on Morgan Stanley click here.

Shares of Morgan Stanley closed at $162.65 yesterday.

You May Also Be Interested In

• Stripe, Advent In Talks To Buy Paypal - WSJ
• AI/ML Innovations plans $2M private placement on the CSE
• Intuitive Machines Inc. (LUNR) PT Lowered to $32 at Cantor Fitzgerald, Reaffirms Overweight Rating