Here are Wall Street’s biggest calls on Thursday:
Needham reiterates Apple as buy
Needham said it’s standing by shares of Apple, but lowered its estimates on the stock due to supply chain and demand concerns.
“We lower our estimates for 1Q23 and FY23, owing to weak macro global consumer demand trends, supply-chain shortages, and growing geopolitical pressures between the US and China which lead to weak iPhone demand in China (about 20% of AAPL’s revs historically) during FY23.”
Morgan Stanley reiterates Tesla as overweight
Morgan Stanley said it sees a “buying opportunity” for shares of Tesla.
“As the ‘ambassador’ of EVs, Tesla’s valuation raises questions for investment returns and capital formation across the sector. Is it time to consider alternative technological paths in addition to EVs? We view this as a buying opportunity.”
Canaccord reiterates Tesla as buy
Canaccord lowered its price target on Tesla shares, but said patient investors will be rewarded over the long term.
“We are adjusting our estimates and price target to $275 (from $304) but — with the current pressure and some patience — trust this holiday coal will turn into a long-term performance diamond.”
Piper Sandler reiterates Tesla as overweight
Piper said Tesla could become a key ESG holding.
“Tesla could become a core ESG holding – especially if Elon Musk’s influence begins to wane.”
Needham reiterates Amazon as buy
Needham said it’s standing by its buy rating on the stock but that investors need to see more pricing power from the e-commerce giant.
“Is AMZN in a lousy business or do they do a lousy job running it? AMZN states that they are focused on cost-cutting. We don’t object. However, investors also want AMZN to demonstrate upside pricing power in 2023, since cost-cutting has limits to driving valuation upside.”
Needham reiterates Alphabet as buy
Needham lowered its price target on the stock to $115 from $160, but said its moats are “deep and wide.”
“We believe that GOOGL is a globally scaled internet platform that benefits from winner-take-most economics. Its moats are deep and wide, buttressed by powerful data network effects that create a flywheel of more searches that improve each sequential search.”
Needham reiterates Netflix as hold
Needham said it’s concerned about sub-par subscriber growth heading into 2023.
“NFLX’s peak subs may be behind it, because churn is rising for all OTT (over the top).”
Bank of America reiterates Palantir as buy
Bank of America said the sell-off in shares is overdone.
“Palantir reached a new stock price low of $6.31 after an 8.5% decline so far this week. This comes amid increasing market concerns about software infrastructure spending heading into a recession, news articles criticizing the company’s unsuccessful SPAC-investment strategy, and sell-side consensus downgrades.”
Goldman Sachs reiterates Micron as buy
Goldman said it’s standing by its buy rating on shares of the computer memory and data storage company, but that the “pace of pricing recovery [is] still uncertain.”
“While we maintain our Buy rating on MU on favorable risk-reward, we acknowledge that Micron, along with its industry peers, will need to demonstrate sustained and consistent supply-side discipline for pricing to improve in 2HCY23 and for investors to once again believe that memory industry margins and FCF can grow on a through-cycle basis.”
Morgan Stanley reiterates Wells Fargo as overweight
Morgan Stanley said the banking giant is a top beneficiary of rate increases.
“WFC is one of the biggest beneficiaries of rising rates with a 50bp increase in Fed Funds driving a 6% increase in EPS.”
Evercore ISI initiates American Express Global Business Travel Group as outperform
Evercore initiated the corporate travel business company with an outperform rating and said it’s a beneficiary of corporate travel recovery.
“We’re initiating coverage of American Express Global Business Travel Groupwith an Outperform rating and $8.00 price target. AmEx GBT is the leading business to business travel management platform, providing software and services to manage travel, expenses, and events for corporate travel.”
Piper Sandler names SolarEdge and First Solar as top 2023 picks
Piper named SolarEdge and First Solar as top ideas heading into next year and says “renewable development is poised to materially accelerate.”
“Due to the passage of the IRA into law and the global energy crisis spurred by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the pace of renewable development is poised to materially accelerate over the coming decade.”