Piper Jaffray Maintains Neutral On Green Plains Renewable (GPRE)

Piper Jaffray has a Neutral rating and is raising its price target to $14 from $13 Green Plains Renewable GPRE. In a note sent to investors, Piper Jaffray writes, "We maintain our Neutral rating on shares of GPRE following management's presentation and investor meetings at the Piper Jaffray Cleantech Conference. We are taking our FY11 EPS estimate up to $1.51 and our target to $14. The increased estimates reflect a relatively healthy 1Q and 4Q forward margin environment, the recent acquisition of 2 plants from Otter Tail (that we anticipate will be accretive to 2011 earnings), and an upbeat management presentation. Green Plains has also seen initial success in their testing of corn oil extraction technology and plans to roll out the extraction skids to 6 plants this year." Shares of GPRE gained 5 cents yesterday to close at $11.73, a gain of 0.4%.