Amid “continued demand momentum” for the travel industry, JPMorgan is bullish on Carnival. The bank upgraded cruise ship shares to overbought from neutral in a note Monday. Analyst Matthew Boss also raised his price target to $16 from $11, implying a more than 22% increase from Friday’s closing price. “CCL has the opportunity to drive improved brand clarity and pricing power by increasing investment in advertising (compared to historically low investment compared to peers) and providing providing a smaller record of capacity growth, which provides a quicker route for management to focus on reducing balance sheet balance,” the boss wrote. He added that CEO Josh Weinstein – who took over last year – emphasized in meetings with JPMorgan analysts that Carnival’s business strength is more balanced than previous historical trends. epidemic. Boss highlighted Weinstein’s remarks that Carnival “no longer rides on the tails of post-pause pent-up.” “For many years, CCL has had six private destinations around the Caribbean (~5.5 million visitors per year = total of the rest of the industry) and is leveraging its land assets to promote further value creation in 2H25 with (i) a meaningful expansion of Half Moon Cay by building a pier to carry larger ships and improve the visitor experience ashore,” Boss said. Analysts say Carnival’s new CEO and leadership changes offer promising growth opportunities. He noted that the company has engaged in other efforts to improve, such as retiring more than 20 ships because of the pandemic and repositioning ship assets to more well-known brands. “On the business front, we were very confident with current trends with all three management teams,” said Boss. Shares are up 62.4% year-to-date and more than 30% over the past 12 months. Shares were up 3.5% Monday during premarket trading. —Michael Bloom of CNBC contributed to this report.