Piper Jaffray Overweight On Portfolio Recovery Associates (PRAA)

Piper Jaffray has an Overweight rating and a $103 price target on shares of Portfolio Recovery Associates PRAA.

In a note to clients, Piper Jaffray writes, "We have increased confidence in our 1Q11 cash collection forecasts for both PRAA
and ECPG given the trends in "recoveries" or collections of charged-off balances at 4 major credit card issuers. Industry 1Q collections are trending slightly above the historical average growth rate. Further bolstering our confidence in our cash
collection forecasts is the relative improvement in weekly jobless claims, lower y/y bankruptcy filings, a deleveraging consumer, and generally improving payment rate and spending trends on credit cards. We reiterate our Overweight ratings on both PRAA and ECPG."

Shares of PRAA lost 56 cents yesterday to close at $79.22, a loss of 0.7%.