J.B. Hunt stock bounces back. (Trucking & Transportation).

Shares of J.B. Hunt Transport Services of Lowell spent last week on a roller coaster, beginning with a plunge on Monday when when a report by Morgan Stanley questioned a sale-leaseback structure the company used in 1999 to lower its tax rate.

The stock (NYSE: JBHT), which finished the previous trading week at $28.10, closed at $25.10 on Monday, rebounded to $26.45 by the close on Tuesday, and was down to $24.83 at the end of trading on Wednesday. The price was up again in early trading on Thursday, the day J.P. Morgan initiated coverage of the company with a "buy" recommendation.

During a rare conference call Monday, President and CEO Kirk Thompson said J.B. Hunt had no "accounting-related issues" and was "not being investigated by the IRS." He said the sale-leaseback structure was proper and that the IRS hadn't contacted J.B. Hunt about them.

Thompson also said there is "no connection between the IRS's recent interest in tax shelters and J.B. Hunt.

Meanwhile, Deutsche Bank upgraded shares of J.B. Hunt to "strong buy" from "buy," saying that the company's fundamental outlook remains attractive and is strengthening. A suspicious market had overblown the importance of the accounting issue, it said.

Stephens Inc. of Little Rock also upgraded its recommendation on JBHT from "underweight" to "equal-weight."

Also during the conference call on Monday, J.B. Hunt announced second-quarter earnings of $15.5 million, or 40 cents per share. That's an increase of 80 percent over the second quarter of last year, when it reported earnings of $8.6 million, or 24 cents per share.

Analysts had expected J.B. Hunt to make between 25 cents and 30 cents a share, according to Thomson/First Call.