Microsoft initiated, Broadcom upgraded: Wall Street's top analyst calls
The most talked about and market moving research calls around Wall Street are now in one place. Here are today's research calls that investors need to know, as compiled by The Fly.
Top Upgrades:
TD Cowen upgraded Broadcom (AVGO) to Outperform from Market Perform with a price target of $1,500, up from $1,400, following the company's artificial intelligence infrastructure event. The firm sees potential upside from both Broadcom's custom silicon and back-end AI networking, as well as from synergies as VMWare is integrated.
Argus upgraded Micron (MU) to Buy from Hold with a $140 price target. The company posted a "solid" Q2 profit against expectations of losses, while its revenue was "well above" the high end of prior guidance range, the firm tells investors in a research note.
Northland upgraded Fabrinet (FN) to Outperform from Market Perform with a price target of $220, up from $200. The firm views the recent pullback as "overdone" and believes the company remains well positioned to benefit from growth in AI data center at top customer Nvidia (NVDA) and more broadly at 800G and eventually 1.6T given increasing AI driven throughput.
Rosenblatt upgraded Paramount (PARA) to Neutral from Sell with a price target of $13, up from $9. The Ellison family's Skydance is reported to be in talks to buy the Redstone family's National Amusements, which owns 10% of Paramount equity but 77% of Paramount's voting rights, while Apollo's (APO) reported studio offer highlights the studio asset value, the firm tells investors.
Rosenblatt upgraded Warner Bros. Discovery (WBD) to Neutral from Sell with a price target of $10, up from $7. If Paramount is broken up, Warner Bros. Discovery would be perceived as likely to, as well, with similar puts/takes, the firm tells investors.
Top Downgrades:
Stephens downgraded Centene (CNC) to Equal Weight from Overweight with a price target of $85, down from $92. The business and stock performance have been "firmly locked into a largely repetitive 'one-step forward, one-step back' cycle" over the past two years, says the firm, which adds that the disappointing Texas STAR and CHIP Medicaid RFP outcome "continued this trend into 2024."
Roth MKM downgraded JinkoSolar (JKS) to Neutral from Buy with a price target of $25, down from $50. The firm states that its rating change is pending the company improving its profitability profile, adding that while the industry is struggling through an oversupply situation, JinkoSolar is in a strong position to consolidate share with its leading TOPCon/cost structure.
Top Initiations:
KeyBanc initiated coverage of Microsoft (MSFT) with an Overweight rating and $490 price target. Microsoft "sits in the catbird seat in two of the three main ways software vendors can monetize the AI wave," with Azure and the suite of copilots being rolled out across Office and elsewhere in the product portfolio, the firm tells investors.
KeyBanc initiated coverage of ServiceNow (NOW) with an Overweight rating and $1,000 price target, citing a belief it is "the best platform play in a sector that continues to search for platforms."
KeyBanc initiated coverage of Oracle (ORCL) with an Overweight rating and $150 price target. While Oracle is in the "unenviable situation where its entire quarter is defined by a single number," namely Oracle Cloud Infrastructure growth in constant currency, the firm believes it "can build a legitimate fourth" U.S.-based public cloud of scale and expects standalone OCI growth to remain above 50% this year and into next.
KeyBanc initiated coverage of Salesforce (CRM) with a Sector Weight rating and no price target. While noting that the firm's estimates are above consensus on "a few metrics in the near term" and giving the company credit for "living under a totally new operating regime," the firm thinks that to be more bullish investors are going to have to assume that incremental margins will sustainably be "some of the best in software," the data cloud can remain in hypergrowth for the next several years, that the buyback authorization is drained in the next 18-24 months, and that the multiple will expand.
KeyBanc initiated coverage of Adobe (ADBE) with an Underweight rating and $445 price target. The firm expects competitive pressure to rise in the coming years and to slow Creative Cloud growth to the high single digits due to both generative AI and the emergence of strong low-end tools.
