GIS Stock Nears Fresh High on Bull Note

Piper Sandler upgraded General Mills to "overweight" from "neutral"

Packaged food producer General Mills, Inc. (NYSE:GIS) is up 1% at $59.41 after Piper Sandler upgraded the equity to "overweight" from "neutral" and lifted its price target to $67 from $59. The analyst said General Mills' recent retail trends and limited exposure to the foodservice space indicates that it is well positioned to outperform in the current market.

The pop puts GIS at a one-month high, which is just a chip shot from its two-year peak of $60. Looking back, the equity has enjoyed recent support at its 10-day moving average, which helped guide GIS away from its late-March plummet near the $47 region. Since then, GIS is up roughly 25%, and boasts a 10% year-to-date gain.

The majority of the brokerage bunch still isn't sold on General Mills. Of the 12 covering the cereal specialist, only two call it a "strong buy" while the rest say "hold." Adding to this, the consensus 12-month price target of $58.88 is right in line with last night's close.

Echoing this, GIS sports a 10-day put/call volume ratio of 0.82 at the the International Securities Exchange (ISE), Cboe Options Exchange (CBOE), and NASDAQ OMX PHLX (PHLX) which sits in the 75th percentile of its annual range. This means that while long calls are still outnumbering long puts overall, there's been a healthier-than-usual appetite for these bearish bets of late.