SS&C Technologies Upgraded To Overweight At Morgan Stanley

Morgan Stanley upgraded SS&C Technologies Holdings, Inc. (NASDAQ: SSNC) to Overweight from Equal Weight on expectations of an inflection in organic growth, margin expansion and lower leverage from robust cash flow.

The brokerage sees several key drivers for an organic revenue growth inflection into the second half of this year. The drivers include improving retention rates, Advent Software contribution and easier license comparisons versus last year. Further, cross-selling, salesforce overhaul and potential stabilization of AUA levels should also aid growth.

"In our view, these items could contribute over 600bps of cumulative organic growth in 2H16," analyst Brian Essex wrote in a note.

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On the margin front, Essex said the acquisition of Advent could drive the company's long-term EBITDA margins above its long-term guidance of 41–43 percent, driven by "cross selling, infrastructure savings, fixed costs leverage and streamlined R&D and marketing spend."

In addition, Essex expects improving cash position to improve leverage and could drive debt/EBITDA under 4x by the end of this year.

The analyst also raised his price target by $2 to $39, while the stock closed Monday's trading at $31.78.

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