Shares of PayPal Holdings Inc. were little changed in premarket trading Wednesday after Jefferies analyst Ramsey El-Assal raised his price target on the stock to $95, a new Street high. He’s upbeat about broad consumer spending trends toward the end of last year, ahead of PayPal’s fourth-quarter earnings release. “Particularly robust eCommerce figures in October/November/December… mirror the structural shift from in-store to online spending,” El-Assal wrote, citing SpendTrend data. He also likes the company’s free-cash-flow positioning as a result of selling its loan portfolio to Synchrony Financial . ” We continue to view PayPal as a compelling long term opportunity given scarcity value among large-caps due to growth/profitability profile, global secular tailwinds, and an enviable cash flow/balance sheet position,” he wrote. The stock closed at a new record high on Tuesday. PayPal shares are up 99% over the past 12 months, while the S&P 500 Index is up 23% in that time.
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