Admiral Group Plc (LON:ADM) was the subject of a big upgrade today as Nomura moved to ‘buy’, from ‘hold’, and lifted its price target to £23.25 from £16.30.
The broker is positive on the European general (or non-life) insurance sector which Nomura describes as ‘still very special’.
A ‘buy’ recommendation was also repeated for RSA Insurance Group Plc (LON:RSA), and Nomura’s target moved to 510p from 495p.
“As expected, the UK non-life names have performed well on a relative basis year to date amid market turbulence,” Nomura analyst Fahad Changazi said in a note.
“However, strong results by RSA, Direct Line and Admiral, and subsequent strong share price performance on the day, served to highlight the bottom-up attractiveness of UK non-life stocks.”
Commenting specifically on Admiral, Changazi added: “Our two key reasons for upgrading Admiral are exposure to rising UK motor rates and potential to pay out excess capital return above guidance (£300m vs £150-200m guidance).”
Elsewhere, Citigroup spliced 35p off its price target for Barclays Plc (LON:BARC) - and the broker’s ‘buy’ now targets 200p per share.
Investec cooled on engineering group Meggit Plc (LON:MGGT) which it now rates as ‘add’ rather than ‘buy’.
Meanwhile, Liberum Capital downgraded Kurdistan oil producer Genel Energy Plc (LON:GENL) to ‘hold’ from ‘buy’. And, also downgraded African airline Fastjet Plc (LON:FJET) to ‘hold’ from ‘buy’ as well.
Hay fever vaccine specialist Allergy Therapeutics PLC’s (LON:AGY) mix of continued commercial traction and breadth of new product opportunities underpins the investment case, according to Panmure Gordon.
A target price of 51p gives strong upside against current levels and a placing in November has given it the firepower to acquire/license additional products. Buy says the broker.