JPMorgan thinks it’s time to ditch electric vehicle charging company EVgo. Analyst Bill Peterson downgraded the stock to neutral from overweight, saying the company continues to be affected by permitting delays and supply chain shortages. EVgo also recently announced it will focus most of its capital and resources on existing locations, reducing its ability to focus on new location development — something JP Morgan believes is critical to long-term growth. Peterson writes: “We continue to like the company’s strategy with a core focus on urban/suburban charging in good locations with notable partnerships with OEM vehicle manufacturers, ride-hailing companies and autonomous vehicles”. However, “we think its network throughput growth will likely be dampened by slower site growth.” Shares traded 2% higher in the previous marketing session despite the downgrade. Although EVgo recently announced a partnership with Amazon’s Alexa, which will guide electric vehicle users to EVgo charging stations, the company’s growth prospects remain bleak. JPMorgan said early signs of consolidation between electric vehicle charging operators and larger energy players, such as Shell and Volta, could pose a threat to EVgo. Such partnerships provide competitors with greater scale and capital to deploy chargers. Further challenges lie ahead for the broader electric vehicle charging market, JP Morgan added. To be sure, the analyst notes that the proposed electricity-based credits “could provide some incremental gains (estimated $3.6 billion total available for distribution to those in need). eligible players) in the 2025 timeframe if biogas electricity becomes a creditable fuel.” However, he also said that higher inflation and input costs mean “capital intensification will be higher than we previously expected”. The analyst lowered his price target for the company to $6 from $10. The new target implies a gain of less than 1% from Wednesday’s close. EVgo stock has had a strong start to the year, up 33.6%. However, the stock has fallen about 20% in the past 12 months. —Michael Bloom of CNBC contributed to this report.