MetLife price target raised to $94 from $92 at Piper Sandler

Piper Sandler analyst John Barnidge raised the firm’s price target on MetLife (MET) to $94 from $92 and keeps an Overweight rating on the shares. The firm is generally reducing EPS estimates for the group driven by fee and spread headwinds, and favors underwriting areas of lifecoland as a result. Fee businesses have client outflows, less fee and trading days and seasonally higher expenses. Spread has prospect of variable investment income normalization being pushed out, floater impact and possible negative commentary around prospective spread income expectations in Piper’s opinion.