On Monday, Evercore ISI maintained a positive outlook on Huntington Bancshares Incorporated (NASDAQ: NASDAQ:HBAN), raising the price target from $18.00 to $20.00 while reaffirming an Outperform rating. The financial institution is recognized for its robust fundamental trajectory, which includes better-than-peer loan and deposit trends, increasing net interest income (NII) growth, and moderate net interest margin (NIM) upside.
The analyst highlighted the company's favorable fee trends and the expectation for positive operating leverage. Credit trends at Huntington Bancshares are also seen as favorable, with a lower risk profile and a solid loan loss reserve (LLR) in comparison to its peers.
Huntington Bancshares has shown a modest outperformance in the banking sector year-to-date and is currently trading in line with its peers based on price-to-earnings (P/E) ratio at 11 times its projected 2026 earnings. It also trades at a modest premium on a price-to-tangible book value (P/TBV) basis, standing at 2.0 times tangible book value compared to 1.7 times for its peers.
The firm believes that Huntington Bancshares is well-positioned to drive incremental upside to its already above-average return on tangible common equity (ROTCE) in 2025 and 2026. This potential is seen as a supportive factor for the stock's relative valuation.
The upbeat assessment follows an investor dinner hosted by Evercore ISI last week, which included discussions with Zach Wasserman, CFO of Huntington Bancshares, and Tim Sedabres, Head of Investor Relations. The meeting reinforced the analyst's constructive stance on the bank's fundamentals.
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