The Globe and Mail reports in its Tuesday, Oct. 31, edition that Scotia Capital analyst George Doumet has reaffirmed his "sector outperform" recommendation for Canadian Tire. The Globe's David Leeder writes that Mr. Doumet slashed his share target back by $19 to $172. Analysts on average target the shares at $179.90. Mr. Doumet sees "a softening topline trend" happening at Canadian Tire. He says that trend is being partially "offset by a continued robust gross margin performance." Canadian Tire is slated to release its third quarter results on Nov. 9. Mr. Doumet says in a note: "While we expect the soft demand environment to continue over the NTM [next 12 months] and for growth to resume in the latter part of 2H/24, we see Canadian Tire as being more resilient to downturns thanks to its strong loyalty program, omni-channel capability, data analytics, own brands, and tiered assortments. We believe a significant amount of pessimism has been baked into the valuation, with shares down almost 21 per cent since the removal of its aspirational targets last quarter and currently trading at about a 16-per-cent discount vis-a-vis the historical average, on what we believe is close to NTM trough earnings."