J.P. Morgan Chase (JPM: sentiment, chart, options) is once again making headlines for absorbing one of its battered banking peers. The firm that swallowed up Bear Stearns earlier this year has now purchased the banking assets of Seattle-based thrift Washington Mutual (WM) -- but that's not the only news from JPM this morning. The company is attracting plenty of analyst attention, and the Dow component has also priced a new common stock offering.

First up, JPM priced a $10-billion offering of about 246.9 million shares of its common stock at a price of $40.50 per share. The price represents a discount of about 7% to the security's closing price on Thursday. Closing for the transaction is expected to take place sometime around next Tuesday.

On the analyst front, Merrill Lynch adjusted its earnings expectations for JPM in light of its WaMu acquisition. The brokerage firm now expects a third-quarter loss of 40 cents per share, compared to its previous forecast of 24 cents per share. Merrill also raised its fourth-quarter profit outlook on JPM from 45 cents per share to 58 cents per share.

Elsewhere, Fox-Pitt raised its rating on J.P. Morgan from "in line" to "outperform." The analysts noted that JPM has marked its acquired assets from WM and Bear Stearns at very conservative levels, and upward revisions to earnings-per-share estimates are likely. However, like Merrill, Fox-Pitt expects a short-term drop in profits -- the firm now expects a third-quarter profit of 32 cents per share, rather than 51 cents per share.

In early trading, JPM is up about 2% to trade above $44. Option players have flocked to the stock's October 45 call, which has so far traded volume of 4,023 on open interest of 20,822 contracts.