Sainsbury among FTSE 100 leaders on Goldman upgrade

LONDON (Reuters) - Shares in J. Sainsbury (SBRY.L: Quote, Profile, Research), Britain's third-largest supermarket group, climbed as much as 4.4 percent early on Tuesday after Goldman Sachs upgraded the stock to "buy" from "neutral" and added it to its conviction list.

"We believe Sainsbury's share price sufficiently captures the recent slow down in top-line growth, given valuation on most metrics now look attractive," said Goldman analysts in a note.

"Highlighting this point, JS is the only company in our universe where the property value of 8.6 billion pounds is higher than its current EV.... Investors are now buying the underlying property with a "free option" on a continued recovery and potential corporate activity, should credit conditions improve later in the year."

At 03:23 a.m. EST,. Sainsbury shares tacked on 3.6 percent at 393 pence.

(Reporting by Michael Taylor and Dominic Lau)