Freight Gets a Lift, Power Names Slip

Analyst activity on Wednesday skewed toward transport and utilities. Old Dominion Freight Line picked up an upgrade, with consensus buy recommendations climbing to 13 from 9. The average target price edged lower to $219.71, but the directional shift matters more. LTL freight has been under pressure this year and the call suggests the worst may be priced in.

Cruise stocks also caught a bid. Freedom Broker lifted Royal Caribbean from Hold to Buy with a $379 target, above the current consensus of $351. Welltower got the same firm's upgrade to Buy at a $255 target, adding a bullish voice to the senior housing REIT.

On the other side, power names took target cuts. CIBC trimmed its price target on Vistra Corp to $181 from $201, keeping a Buy but pulling back materially. NRG Energy also saw its CIBC target fall to $159 from $173. Both stocks remain rated Buy but the reductions signal some caution around power sector valuations.

That caution extends to American Electric Power, where the consensus target edged up slightly to $141.54. Separately, ORTEX alt data shows Southern Company's reactor output fell 10 standard deviations below its own history as of 27 October, the sharpest deviation on record in the nuclear output dataset. Unplanned outages of that magnitude add costs and can weigh on forward earnings expectations across regulated utilities.

C.H. Robinson saw its target trimmed to $191.83, though the stock retains a wall of Hold ratings. Biogen got a modest consensus target bump to $254.17 but remains heavily weighted to Sell.