Piper Jaffray Neutral On Itron (ITRI)

Piper Jaffray has a Neutral rating and a $71 price target on shares of Itron, Inc. ITRI. In a note sent to clients, Piper Jaffray writes, "We are maintaining our Neutral rating on ITRI shares following the company's presentation at Piper Jaffray's Sixth Annual Cleantech & Renewables Conference in NY, but in the next 3 months we would expect shares to continue their recent rise. The project pipeline in North America and Europe remains robust, though timing of project award and deployment remains unclear. With that said, investor expectations are low (as are valuations), which could lead to a positive move in the shares should 4Q results surprise to the upside. Additionally, we believe DistribuTech could be an important unveiling for a co-developed product with Cisco." Shares of ITRI gained 79 cents yesterday to close at $59.03, a gain of 1.4%.