UPDATE: Morgan Stanley Reiterates On Associated Banc-Corp As Lower Provision Offsets Remediation Reserve Build

In a report published Friday, Morgan Stanley analyst Ken A. Zerbe reiterated an Equal-Weight rating on

, but removed the $18.00 price target. In the report, Morgan Stanley noted, “Associated's 3Q14 EPS beat our estimate by a penny but fell short of consensus, backing out $5 mil of pretax asset gains in the quarter. These gains accounted for $0.02 of its $0.31 reported EPS. The main positive in the quarter was the sharply lower than expected provision expense, which came in at just $1 mil versus our estimate of $8 mil. This was driven mostly by a large $7 mil recovery in investor CRE, which drove the lower net charge-offs of just $3 mil (MS = $8 mil). Management's comment on the call was that credit won't get much better than this; we agree.” Associated Banc-Corp closed on Thursday at $16.92.