Morgan Stanley Suggests Pair Trade For Steel Earnings

Morgan Stanley sees a second quarter beat for Nucor NUE and miss for AK Steel AKS, according to a research report published Tuesday.

Morgan Stanley boosted its EPS estimate for Nucor by more than 29 percent from $0.58 to $0.75. The analyst consensus is $0.61. Commenting on the change, analyst Evan Kurtz writes, “We believe Nucor has been able to take advantage of year-to-date competitor outages by taking market share. We expect the Steel Products business to show substantially improved profitability as weather impact eases and construction activity picks up.”

On the other hand, Kurtz does not expect a strong quarter from AK Steel; EPS estimates were cut from $0.08 to a $0.03 loss. The analyst consensus is currently $0.10. Kurtz writes, “We expect 2Q14 earnings to mark a trough for the year, but are also below consensus in 3Q14 as the timing of outage costs may spill over into the next quarter. However, the company should benefit from falling iron ore costs over the course of the year and some investors may look to buy a miss.”

Both Nucor and AK Steel are up very low volume today, to $50.39 and $6.84.