Jefferies Believes Entergy's Current Share Price Adequately Reflects Risk Associated With Several Unresolved Issues

Analysts at Jefferies & Co reiterate their "hold" rating on Entergy

, while reducing their estimates for the company. The target price for ETR has been reduced from $82 to $80. Jefferies & Co says, “We believe Entergy's current share price adequately reflects risk associated with several unresolved issues. These include the potential need to construct cooling towers at Indian Point, Vermont Yankee re-licensing in 2012 and a likely challenge by the IRS of NOL carryovers.” “Depending on the outcome of these issues, we believe fair value for Entergy ranges from $76-$82.50 per share….Additionally, while we believe that Vermont Yankee is likely to ultimately be relicensed, we estimate that a potential early shutdown would have a $4-4.50 per share negative impact on value,” the analysts add. Jefferies has lowered its EPS estimates for 2011 and 2012 from $6.80 to $6.75 and from $6.60 to $6.55, respectively.