BMO Capital Maintains Market Perform Rating, $25 PT for Safeway

In a report issued earlier today, BMO Capital Markets maintained its Market Perform rating and $25 price target for Safeway Inc. SWY. BMO Capital went on to say “In light of speculation on what is motivating Safeway to make some unusual changes to corporate governance, management structure, and capital structure, our interest was piqued enough to explore a scenario where Safeway and Kroger merge. We have, in fact, been contemplating this scenario for a while because we strongly believe a combination makes strategic sense, and, upon further analysis, we now also strongly believe a combination makes sense for shareholders of both companies. Our analysis treats Kroger as the acquirer from a P&L perspective and we assume a $30 take-out price on SWY (~40% upside).” Safeway Inc. closed on Friday at $21.19.