UPDATE: Bank of America Maintains United Rentals at Buy After Stellar Results From Peer Ashtead

In a report published Tuesday, Bank of America reiterated its Buy rating on shares of United Rentals URI and maintained its $66 price target. Bank of America reported that, “We view Ashtead's positive results as a positive read-across for Buy-rated United Rentals (URI, $52.05, C-1-9), as well as (to a lesser extent) Neutral-rated aerial work platform OEM Terex (TEX, $31.93, C-2-9). Ashtead's Sunbelt chain is United Rentals' biggest competitor in the US, and a likely customer of Terex. Ashtead (covered by our UK colleague Andy Murphy) posted a 45% YoY increase in fiscal third quarter EBITDA (ended January 31, 2013), to £121mn, 10% above the BofA forecast. Sunbelt's rental revenue grew 27% during the quarter (driven by fleet on rent +14%, with 11% higher yield) and diluted EPS rose 164% YoY, to 6.7p. Hurricane Sandy contributed about 500bp of the growth, although Ashtead does not expect this benefit to repeat in the fiscal fourth quarter ended April." Shares of United Rental closed at $52.05 on Monday.