CFRA, an independent research provider, has provided MT Newswires with the following research alert. Analysts at CFRA have summarized their opinion as follows:
We believe BX’s outlook is positive, but valuation may be stretched a bit. We cut our target $5 to $130, a forward P/E of 26.5x our ’24 distributed cash earnings (DE) view, above the three-year historical average at 24.0x. Private markets (equity, real estate, credit, infrastructure) are active, but we see a more gradual upward curve on DE in ’24. We drop our ’24 DE to $4.90 ($5.25) and ’25’s to $6.20 ($6.35). Our revenue forecast is $13.0B in ’24 and $15.5B in ’25. For industry financial metrics, performance revenues were flat in Q1 24, total net realizations were +9%, and DE was +11% ($0.96, $0.01 below consensus). LTM Investment performance was best in Infrastructure (+18.9%), Private Credit (+17.2%), Corporate Private Equity (+12.7%), and Liquid Credit (+12.4%), while underperformers were Opportunistic (-5.6%) and Core+ (-1.5%). Fund net inflows in Q1 were +$34B (+$142B LTM) and dry powder to invest was $191B. AUM was $1.06T (+7%), fee earning AUM was $781B (+7%), and perpetual capital was $408B (+7%).