Primark owner Associated British Food (LON:ABF) rose to the top of the FTSE 100 risers thanks to an upgrade from Goldman Sachs, which switched from a ‘sell’ to a ‘buy’, and said the stock’s underperformance in the year to date now presents an investment opportunity.
“We estimate the US Primark stores will add £720mln to group EBIT by 2020, and believe near-term concerns from weak sugar, and dollar sourcing for Primark, have been well flagged,” analyst Fulvio Cazzol said in a note.
Elsewhere, Barclay’s Capital upgraded Africa focussed exploration group Ophir Energy (LON:OPHR) to ‘overweight’ from ‘equal weight’.
The bank also nudged higher target prices for sector peers Enquest (LON:ENQ) and Premier Oil (LON:PMO), though the former remains an ‘underweight’ pick while it is recommended that investors are ‘overweight’ the latter.
Credit Suisse lifted its target price for energy sector engineer Weir (LON:WEIR) to 2205p from 1915p, and an ‘outperform’ rating was repeated.
Liberum Capital repeated ‘sell’ recommendations for miners BHP Billiton (LON:BLT) and Anglo America (LON:AAL), with the respective target prices reduced to 1150p from 1200p and 850p from 900p.
The broker also reduces its target for Rio Tinto (LON:RIO) to 2500p from 2600p, it is also deemed to be a ‘sell’.