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Guggenheim Boosts Price Target for American Express; Digital Push to Pay Off? (AXP)

By Dividend.com April 12, 2012, 08:52:46 AM EDT

Credit card issuer American Express Company ( AXP ) on Thursday caught some further positive commentary from analysts at Guggenheim & Co.

The firm maintained its "Buy" rating on AXP and lifted its price target $63 to $67, suggesting a nearly 18% upside to the stock's Wednesday closing price of $56.95.

A Guggenheim analyst commented, "AXP's American Express Payment Gateway announcement is important as it reflects a continued push into the digital space with merchant services that build relationships to promote bill business growth while driving incremental fee income."

Continuing, "Given our increased comfort with longer-term revenue growth, we are raising our price target by $4 to $67, which reflects 13x our FY13E EPS; as operating leverage emerges, greater multiple expansion could occur as the 10-year median FY2 forward P/E is 15x."

American Express shares, which have surged 21% year-to-date, were unchanged in premarket trading Thursday.

The Bottom Line
Shares of American Express ( AXP ) have a 1.40% dividend yield, based on last night's closing stock price of $56.95. The stock has technical support in the $52-$54 price area. If the shares can firm up, we see overhead resistance around the $58-$60 price levels.

American Express Company ( AXP ) is not recommended at this time, holding a Dividend.com DARS™ Rating of 3.4 out of 5 stars.

Be sure to visit our complete recommended list of the Best Dividend Stocks , as well as a detailed explanation of our ratings system here .




The views and opinions expressed herein are the views and opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of The NASDAQ OMX Group, Inc.


This article appears in: Investing, Stocks

Referenced Stocks: AXP



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