There’s a “new energy” now at New York Community Bank , JPMorgan says. For the first time during its coverage of the bank dating back to the great financial crisis, JPMorgan upgraded shares to overweight from neutral. New York Community Bank has undergone a significant transformation over the past year. After its merger with midwestern-based Flagstar Bank, NYCB acquired certain assets and liabilities of Signature Bank. It also absorbed teams from the former First Republic Bank, making it a home to 127 private banking teams in more than 10 cities combined. “With ~$120B of assets behind the company and a new energy under CEO Tom Cangemi, we see New York Community emerging as a potential massive market share taker over the next several years ,” analyst Steven Alexopoulos wrote in a Friday note. The analyst raised his price target on shares to $16 from $13. The new price objective implies almost 23% upside from Thursday’s close. “While we don’t downplay the challenge of cultural integration that still lies ahead, it’s very clear to us that this company is already fully on offense. In fact, from a culture perspective with the Signature culture being preserved, it’s very likely that NYCB becomes a talent magnet with the former First Republic teams joining as just the tip of the iceberg,” Alexopoulos added. The bank posted an earnings and revenue beat for the second quarter, Alexopoulos noted. With regional banking stocks still “out of favor,” investors can currently buy New York Community Bank shares at an 11% discount to its peers in terms of tangible book value, he added. “We see a significant growth runway ahead for the bank combined with the opportunity to improve the bank’s funding mix by replacing high-cost funding with low-cost core deposit growth,” Alexopoulos said . Shares gained almost 2% Friday premarket. The stock is up more than 50% year to date. —CNBC’s Michael Bloom contributed to this report.
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