While hopes have been high for AOL (NYSE: AOL) since its spinoff from Time Warner (NYSE: TWX) last month, JP Morgan analyst Imran Khan is warning against any quick turnaround. In a research note issued this morning, the analyst has initiated coverage of AOL with a “neutral” rating and a price target of $27. That’s more pessimistic than BernsteinResearch, which rated AOL as “outperform” a day after the spinoff, with a price target of $31. As of noon today, AOL’s stock was trading slightly up for the period at $24.70, which is 6.7 percent higher than the $23.15 per share AOL debuted at last month. Surveying AOL’s prospects for life on its own, Khan views the dissolution of Platform-A as a chance for the company to build up its display business, while he believes CEO Tim Armstrong can manage the risks of its current content strategy. But he believes that the real turnaround won’t occur until 2011, as AOL will remain in rebuilding mode for much of this year.
At an industry conference last month, Armstrong was asked about Khan’s view that AOL would restrict some of its own inventory from the company

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