As Aetna Inc. (NYSE: AET) registered an increase of 46 percent in its Q1 operating EPS, analysts at Deutsche Bank maintained its Buy rating on the shares of the company. They raise the stock's price target to $50 from its previous $46.
In its Q1, the company reported operating earnings of $560.2 million, or $1.43 per share, up from $430.6 million, or 98 cents a share. The company's earnings beat analysts' estimate of 97 cents per share. During the quarter, revenue rose 2 percent to $8.3 billion from $8.5 billion. Encouraged by the company's Q1 performance, DB analysts raised their FY2011 EPS estimate by 15 percent. They state that company's prodigy acquisitions should help the company to replace the market share that it lost in 2011 in the commercial market. DB analysts raised the EPS estimate for the company for the next quarter.
On a year-to-date basis, the company's share performance was 28.02 percent. As compared to Standard & Poor's 500, the company's YTD share performance was 20.39 percent.
Aetna is a leading provider of health and related benefits offering health insurance, pharmacy, dental and medicare insurance. The company has a market capitalization of $15.02 billion, and P/E ratio of 11.87. It has 384 million outstanding shares.
Shares of the company added 0.16 percent or 6 cents to trade at $41.51 in the afternoon session.