Here are Friday’s biggest calls on Wall Street: Morgan Stanley reiterates Apple as overweight Morgan Stanley said in a note Friday that it sees several reason for share outperformance. “There are 3 key factors that help to explain Apple’s recent outperformance: 1) growing optimism about Services growth reaccelerating; 2) positively shifting views on the iPhone 15 cycle and the increasing probability of iPhone units growing Y/Y in FY24; and 3) greater confidence in Apple’s ability to maintain record gross margins and protect profitability.” Deutsche Bank reiterates Nike as buy Deutsche said it’s standing by its buy rating heading into earnings next week. “Going into NKE’s 4Q print, all eyes are on FY24 guidance, NA wholesale and the company’s recent decisions to enter back into certain doors, and the recovery in China.” Stephens initiates Sovos Brands as overweight Stephens said the maker of Rao’s tomato sauce is well positioned. “The growth engine of SOVO is Rao’s, which brings high quality taste and nutrition to an Italian Sauce category that is filled with stale legacy brands.” KeyBanc reiterates Chipotle as overweight KeyBanc raised its price target on Chipotle to $2,300 per share from $2,050 and said it sees continued traffic momentum. “Relative to our prior forecast, we see sustained traffic momentum, pricing power, and improving flow-through as inflation on avocados/chicken remains tame.” Compass Point initiates SoFi as sell Compass Point said it sees too many negative catalysts for the stock right now. “With the potential for the balance sheet growth rate to slow over the next few quarters and credit costs to increase materially with portfolio seasoning before accounting for credit deterioration risks, we believe it’s difficult to justify owning SOFI at current levels.” Morgan Stanley upgrades Evotech to overweight from equal weight Morgan Stanley said the drug discovery and development company is well positioned for AI. “Upgrading to Overweight as we believe that strong underlying execution and potential for new collaboration agreements could drive renewed investor interest.” Wells Fargo downgrades Under Armour to equal weight from overweight Wells said Under Armour is now a “show-me” story. “Moving to the sidelines. UAA is likely to remain range bound for the next 6-12 months. 1) Outsized NA (North America_ wholesale exposure (50%+ of revs), 2) elevated inventory (both UAA and in channel).” Read more about this call here. JPMorgan adds a negative catalyst watch on Target JPMorgan said it sees too many negative catalysts ahead for the big box retail giant. “In our view, recently-downgraded TGT faces a number of potential negative catalysts into 2Q earnings in mid-August.” Stephens initiates Valvoline as overweight Stephens said the auto maintenance service company is well positioned. “After the recent divestiture of the Global Products business, Valvoline has an attractive opportunity to reinvest free cash to accelerate unit growth.” Deutsche Bank reiterates C3.ai as sell Deutsche said it’s standing by its sell rating after the AI software provider’s disappointing investor day. “While we appreciate the vast opportunity presented by AI , the event did nothing to ease our skepticism on the true differentiation of the company’s platform, its traction with customers or its ability to hit its constantly evolving financial targets.” Read more about this call here. SVB Securities upgrades Wayfair to marker perform from underperform SVB said Wayfair is a beneficiary of Bed Bath & Beyond’s bankruptcy. “Improving demand from BBBY’s bankruptcy, our above consensus view of operating profitability, and a recent debt maturity extension is a tough narrative to fight as an Underperform. As such we are upgrading to Market Perform with a $44 price target.” Morgan Stanley reiterates Snowflake as overweight Morgan Stanley said it’s bullish heading into the company’s upcoming investor day. “We expect the upcoming investor day will provide a stage for management to make the case for the breadth of Snowflake’s cloud data platform, which now extends well beyond traditional data warehousing and can lend itself to becoming part of the emerging AI stack by serving up enterprise data.” Barclays reiterates Uber as overweight Barclays raised its price target on Uber to $70 per share from $57 and says it’s well positioned. “Even before we get to the Travel Concierge AI future, we see a path for UBER shares to get to $70 based on 15x $10bn in EBITDA.” Roth MKM reiterates Meta as buy Roth raised its price target on the stock to $315 per share from $255 and said it likes the stock’s valuation. “Despite YTD stock price action, META shares remain reasonably valued, in our opinion.” Bernstein reiterates Amazon as outperform Bernstein said in a note that Walmart.com is not yet a “viable” competitor to Amazon . “As it stands today, walmart.com is not really a viable substitute for amazon.com, and it’s exceedingly difficult for us to imagine that many people would even consider replacing their Amazon Prime subscription with WMT+.” Citi reiterates General Motors as buy Citi said it’s standing by its buy rating on the auto maker. “Over the next ~6 months we see several potential catalysts that could reshape sentiment off today’s depressed ~5.5x P/E: Q2 earnings upside that should once again cause GM’s results to stand out for strength and resilience.” Jefferies upgrades Principal Financial to buy from hold Jefferies said in its upgrade of the investment management and insurance company that it sees an attractive entry point. “For 2H:23, we stay cautious, selective and mindful of crowded ideas. We upgrade PFG to Hold on: 1) our view that its CRE exposure is more conservative than average, 2) its 20% P/E de-rating from its recent peak and 3) fairly negative sell-side sentiment.
