Piper upgrades Celanese to Overweight into ‘critical transition year’

Piper Sandler analyst Charles Neivert upgraded Celanese to Overweight from Neutral with a price target of $170, up from $135. The analyst is taking a longer-term view, looking beyond the company’s challenges that remain in 2024. The upgrade reflects Celanese’s progress on earnings and debt Piper sees coming in 2024 and showing more strongly in 2025. The firm e sees 2024 as a “critical transition year” for the company, where it reduces the “sizable overhang” of the debt taken for the M&M acquisition and moves toward a period of constructive cash allocation which begins to benefit investors.