CSX Corp Added To Focus List At J.P. Morgan

• CSX Corporation CSX shares have declined 24.98 percent year to date, touching a low of $25.31 on August 25.
• J.P. Morgan’s Brian P. Ossenbeck has maintained an Overweight rating on the company, with a price target of $39.
• Ossenbeck has added CSX Corp to J.P. Morgan’s Analyst Focus List, while mentioning that it is a value stock that is currently the cheapest among its peers but offers the best upside potential.

Analyst Brian Ossenbeck stated that the company offered “the best upside to improving low track densities as the company leverages more locomotives into better service and intermodal growth.”

CSX is also J.P. Morgan’s “favored Eastern rail stock,” given its coal assets portfolio, which is well suited to facing a negative fundamental outlook.

Also, Ossenbeck believes that the company’s access to interior coal basis could aid utility customers in leveraging “emission control equipment by providing cheaper, higher sulfur coal than commonly found in Eastern coal basins.”

On the other hand, the company’s service metrics are expected to recover in 2016, track densities and volumes being driven higher by CSX Corp’s locomotive fleet expansion, which Ossenbeck stated was the largest in the group.

Although intermodal is underrepresented in the company’s portfolio at present, as compared to its peers, Ossenbeck believes that “the recently expanded hub in Northwest Ohio will help drive growth by opening new markets and taking share off the highway.”