The Globe and Mail reports in its Wednesday, Oct. 2, edition that National Bank Financial analyst Adam Shine has lowered his recommendation for BCE to "sector perform" from "outperform." The Globe's David Leeder writes in the Eye On Equities column that Mr. Shine gave his share target a $4 trim to $48. Analysts on average target the shares at $50.33. Mr. Shine thinks the consensus expectations for BCE's third quarter are currently too high. After reducing his expectations ahead of the Nov. 7 release of its results, Mr. Shine now warns of "muted upside" to his new target for BCE shares. Accordingly, despite seeing its dividend "positioned to be safe," he downgraded his rating. Mr. Shine says in a note: "While we have higher media expectations given easy comp (Hollywood strike last year), ad boost from Euro 2024 and carriage rate agreements, we now expect even weaker ARPU [average revenue per user] and loading metrics for CTS [communication and technology services] amid ongoing competitive industry pricing tactics. ... With elevated competitive intensity not subsiding in wireless and Bell still aggressively pricing fibre internet offers, service revs growth is slowing faster than expected, so we reduced our NAV."