Morgan Stanley lowers Ping An's target price to 89 yuan, maintains "Overweight" rating and continues to list it as a top pick

Morgan Stanley published a research report stating that after China Ping An (02318.HK) released its performance for last year, it has updated its risk-return assessment and made slight adjustments to most key indicators. The forecast for new business value (VNB) for this and next fiscal year has been revised down by no more than 0.5%, mainly focused on the bancassurance channel; at the same time, the forecast for after-tax operating profit (OPAT) for this and next fiscal year has been lowered by 0.5%, due to potential market fluctuations in the property insurance business.

As a result, Morgan Stanley has lowered Ping An's target price by 6%, from HKD 95 to HKD 89, mainly considering the impact of after-tax operating profit and more sustainable and stable growth in dividends per share (DPS), maintaining an "Overweight" rating. However, Morgan Stanley still lists Ping An as a preferred stock, expecting the company to achieve very healthy growth in new business value due to its solid fundamentals, and the drag from real estate is gradually fading