Broker tips: Standard Life Aberdeen, Accesso Technology

Analysts at Jefferies cut their target price for shares of Standard Life Aberdeen from 410.0p to 361.0p, but still saw value in the shares and therefore kept their recommendation at 'buy'.

Commenting on the company's results, the analysts highlighted the fact that assets under management had come in £14.1bn below their forecasts of £551.5bn, but on the flip-side, they said that the group's balance sheet was "solid".

But above all, they called attention to management's commitment to keeping the company's payout at 21.6p per share until growth resumed.

"So, at current levels, SLA will yield over 8% until the dividend starts growing again, after 2021 we expect. With this attractive yield and realisable assets, we still see value in the shares," they said.

To back-up their argument, they also pointed to Standard Life's recent sale of about £380m in shares of HDFC Life which means "we know that SLA is able to realise significant chunks of its non-core assets."

Jefferies had also estimated that the arbitration tribunal's ruling in favour of the wealth manager in its dispute with Lloyds could be worth £250m.

Berenberg reiterated its 'buy' rating on Accesso Technology shares on Friday, with analysts arguing that the company's plans for increased investment in research and development was the "right approach", despite the resulting hit to its estimates for profits and cash flows.

The German broker said increased R&D investment "will allow Accesso to more effectively penetrate its more than 1,100-strong client base with multiple products and accelerate new client deployment," despite the downside of lower full-year EBITDA estimates until 2021.

Earlier in the week, Accesso raised its guidance for R&D spend in 2019 by roughly 30%, or approximately $8.0m, leading Berenberg to axe its estimates for the company's EBITDA by about 24% for fiscal years 2019 to 2021.

Analysts were also impressed as the ticketing division, which is responsible for 66% of sales, enjoyed 18% organic revenue growth following the Merlin contract rollout, new customer installs and continued shift to digital ticketing.

"Ingresso (acquired in March 2018) performed well also, delivering 11% pro-forma growth in FY 2018 despite its largest client, Amazon, exiting the ticketing market in Q1 2018. With relationships with Google, Groupon, Ticketmaster and YPlan already in place, Ingresso’s outlook is bright," said the note.

However, analysts also slashed their target price for the stock from 3,000p to 1,400p as queuing revenue growth remained "subdued" and TE2, acquired for $80m in July 2017, put in a "poor" performance as pro-forma revenues dropped by 30%.

Overall, the analysts remained positive on Accesso's progress, lauding the company for its increased R&D spend, which management said should allow for modular installation that will allow operators to build their platforms over time and the ability to integrate with internal and third-party solutions.