UPDATE: FirstEnergy Capital Upgrades Enerplus to Outperform on Valuation

FirstEnergy Capital raised its rating on Enerplus

from Market Perform to Outperform while reducing its price target from $17 to $15, following the latest quarterly results. FirstEnergy Capital said, "While we recognize that results from the quarter lagged our expectations, we feel the current valuation would be attractive to yield-oriented investors. As a result of initiatives undertaken by the Company earlier this year, Enerplus has strengthened its balance sheet and despite an estimated 1.2x cash use to cash flow metric for next year, we estimate the Company's net debt will exit 2013e at 0.4x its current line of credit, as compared to the group average of 0.6x." Enerplus closed at $12.84 on Friday.