Deutsche Bank Has Hold On American Axle & Mfg.

Deutsche Bank has a Hold rating and a $13.50 price target on shares of American Axle & Mfg. AXL. In a note to clients, Deutsche Bank writes, "American Axle's presentation at the Deutsche Bank Industrials Conference carried an optimistic tone, based the company's medium-term growth prospects. In addition to the company's existing $950MM backlog, AXL is quoting on $1bn of additional new business. And the company continues to see strong cash flow prospects (EBITDA margin at the upper end of 12%-15% and capex at 4-6% of sales). Speaking about the near term, AXL has not seen an change to 2H GMT900 (large pickup and SUV) production schedules. Q2 is also tracking in-line with their plans. Mix could also be favorable has GM is adding heavy-duty pickup production. The company continues to believe concerns about high truck inventories are overblown: Large truck sales typically increase in 2H vs. 1H (we estimate that truck mix typically rises by 130 bps in 2H). And production is normally somewhat lower in the back half, allowing for some normal draw down of inventory. We continue to believe that AXL's shares already reflect relatively conservative assumptions for GM large truck production." Shares of AXL lost 25 cents yesterday to close at $10.08, a loss of 2.42%.