Here are the biggest analyst calls of the day: General Electric, Home Depot, Starbucks & more

Published Thu, Dec 12 20199:16 AM EST

Key Points

UBS upgraded General Electric to buy from neutral.
Credit Suisse upgraded Home Depot to outperform from market perform.
J.P. Morgan upgraded Starbucks to overweight from neutral.
Deutsche Bank resumed coverage of General Mills as buy.
Deutsche Bank resumed coverage of Kellogg as buy.
Deutsche Bank initiated Hewlett Packard Enterprise as buy.
UBS upgraded FedEx to neutral from sell.
UBS downgraded 3M to sell from neutral.
Deutsche Bank opened a catalyst call buy idea on Halliburton.
Evercore ISI upgraded Kroger to outperform from in line.
Argus initiated Peloton as buy.
Compass Point upgraded Charles Schwab to buy from neutral.
Goldman Sachs initiated Bloomin' Brands and Brinker as buy.

Here are the biggest calls on Wall Street on Thursday: UBS upgraded General Electric to 'buy' from 'neutral' UBS upgraded the company in transferred coverage to a new analyst and said the stock was at an "inflection point." "We assume coverage of GE with a Buy rating as we believe the stock is at a positive inflection point into 2020, driven by 1) successful de-levering , 2) strong EPS growth of ~12%/29% in 2020/21E and 3) a tripling of ind. FCF to ~$2.3B in '20e led by Aviation & Healthcare. Power, Renewables and Corporate FCF drags should decline by ~$2B y/y with Gas Power becoming a cash contributor." Read more about this call here . Credit Suisse upgraded Home Depot to 'outperform' from 'market perform' Credit Suisse said the stock offers an "attractive" risk/reward. "While we are early, we believe HD offers an attractive risk/reward now after its recent pullback (-11% since Q3 results), and yesterday's guidance reset, with optionality on improving external and internal drivers in FY20. Beyond that, we firmly believe in this team, and the initiatives aimed to expand its reach to new customer segments and categories, while leveraging its stores, building a differentiated omnichannel and digital experience, and creating the fastest delivery network that will widen its moat over time. Initial reads from these efforts seem positive." Read more about this call here . J.P. Morgan upgraded Starbucks to 'overweight' from 'neutral' J.P. Morgan said in its upgrade of the stock that it had a "high degree of confidence" that a "growth at scale" agenda is working for the coffee chain. "No formal update to model, but we believe US comps are 5%+ and that China results are at least within 1-3% expectations. We expect much of this sales momentum to continue, and expect our/street numbers to trend up through the year. We're upgrading SBUX shares to OW following our July 29th downgrade to Neutral, "Share Performance – Up 91% Y/Y – Exceeded Expectations & Forces Downgrade to Neutral," which was the first time we had not held an OW rating on the name for 15+ years." Read more about this call here . Deutsche Bank resumed coverage of General Mills as 'buy' Deutsche Bank said it sees General Mills as "well positioned" to "deliver consistent and profitable growth." "We see a long runway for growth in Pet, believe share losses in yogurt will abate behind innovation, and see cereal growth holding up better than feared (acknowledging that trends will likely slow on tougher comps and competitive activity). Overall, we believe the company is well positioned to deliver on its goal of consistent and profitable growth — driven by management's focus around innovation with sufficient flexibility to reinvest." Deutsche Bank resumed coverage of Kellogg as 'buy' Deutsche said it sees a positive risk/reward for the food manufacturer. "We see lingering questions about the resiliency of K' s top line and the costs to achieve consistent growth as fair, but believe they are adequately discounted below 17x. Moreover, we see investor focus on K's developed market cereal business underestimating the relative strength and optionality of K's businesses in snacking and emerging markets — even as we believe US cereal is well-positioned to improve in CY20." Deutsche Bank initiated Hewlett Packard Enterprise as 'buy' Deutsche Bank initiated the multinational enterprise information technology and said the company was a long-term growth story. "Our positive view is based on 4 points: 1) Belief in the long-term growth story, which paints a picture of $2.20 or more in EPS by FY23; 2) Core revenue declines are likely overstated as we see a multi-year growth market in HPE 's core TAM; 3) HPE's GreenLake 'as-a-service' product, which offers a flexible alternative to traditional IT hardware consumption and is relatively small today, but should be a tailwind to growth for the foreseeable future; 4) Valuation provides a good floor as we believe HPE remains undervalued vs. peers and its history." UBS upgraded FedEx to 'neutral' from 'sell' UBS said in its upgrade of the shipping company that it no longer sees a "catalyst" for further downside. "Our Sell thesis on FDX has essentially played out as F2020 EPS expectations have fallen sharply and the stock has also moved down. From April 18 (the date this year of FDX's closing high price, and prior to the period in late May / June when expectations were falling), to the present time, FDX stock is down 20% compared to a 2% rise in UPS and 8% rise in the S & P 500. Also from April 18, Consensus EPS for F2020 has fallen 28%. While we do not anticipate near term improvement in financial results from FedEx we believe FDX reflects the bad news and we no longer see a catalyst for further downside." UBS downgraded 3M to 'sell' from 'neutral' UBS downgraded the multinational conglomerate on valuation among other things. "We assume coverage of 3M with a Sell rating as we believe the historic capacity to outperform underlying IP growth will be challenged in the mid term. ... We observe a ~200bps growth and ~70bps pricing disconnect from historic trends based on our proprietary models. We attribute this underperformance to both idiosyncratic factors and geographic mix. Deutsche Bank opened a 'catalyst call buy' idea on Halliburton Deutsche opened a catalyst call buy idea on the oil field service company and said it saw "tightening industry fundamentals." "Our view is the U.S. completions market, where HAL is the industry leader, has bottomed, and we expect incremental data points will point to tightening industry fundamentals. The U.S. pressure-pumping market has realized up to 20% attrition in 2019, and we see opportunity for further retirements over the near term as companies head into year-end equipment reviews with Q4 earnings updates just a month away. As the market leader in U.S. frac, HAL has scope, in our view, to retire a portion of its stacked fleet, which would put a floor under both utilization and pricing." Evercore ISI upgraded Kroger to 'outperform' from 'in line' Evercore said in its upgrade of the grocery company that improving comparable sales and moderating investment spending do not appear to be reflected in the stock. "We are upgrading KR to Outperform as improving comps and moderating investment spend do not appear reflected in valuation and stock performance. ... We look for Kroger to continue to narrow the comp gap vs. WMT, driving a relative re-rating. After a double digit decline in CY18 profit, we see EBIT positioned to grow low single digits in CY20 as ID sales trends improve and multichannel, labor, and price investment should moderate. We are raising our Base Case from $29 to $33 to reflect greater conviction that the ID sales improvement trend is sustainable based on findings from our Millennial Food Survey." Argus initiated Peloton as 'buy' Argus said the exercise equipment company had an attractive valuation. "We are initiating coverage of Peloton , an at-home fitness equipment company, with a BUY rating based on positive business fundamentals and an attractive valuation. We believe that Peloton has strong opportunities to become the global leader in connected fitness equipment. Management currently estimates a total serviceable addressable market of 14 million households." Compass Point upgraded Charles Schwab to 'buy' from 'neutral' Compass Point said it sees upside and a compelling long term earnings growth story for Schwab following its acquisition of TD Ameritrade. "After the stock pop post deal announcement, the easy money has been made. But we see a grind it out, compelling long-term margin expansion/earnings growth story from here. We want to be in front of what we expect to be a lengthy positive EPS revision cycle moving forward with both the AMTD and USAA deals expected to drive positive EPS accretion in 2021 and beyond. And we see upside potential to our estimates on a number of fronts, including core revenue growth assumptions, estimated revenue attrition and revenue synergies beyond the BDA related synergies." Goldman Sachs initiated Bloomin' Brands and Brinker as 'buy' Goldman said in its initiation note of the casual diners that the roll out of delivery services can "offset persistent structural challenges." "We initiate coverage of the Casual Diners, which have consistently ceded share to more convenient options (i.e., drive-thru, fast casual, delivery) for well over two decades. Since 2010, Casual Dining traffic has declined every quarter by 2% on average despite a strong consumer spending backdrop, and off-premise businesses have been the fastest growing segments in Casual Dining - suggesting consumers favor convenience over experience. ... While structural headwinds remain, BLMN and EAT have just rolled out third party delivery."

Kevin Johnson, CEO, Starbucks

Scott Mlyn | CNBC

Here are the biggest calls on Wall Street on Thursday:

UBS upgraded General Electric to 'buy' from 'neutral'

UBS upgraded the company in transferred coverage to a new analyst and said the stock was at an "inflection point."

"We assume coverage of GE with a Buy rating as we believe the stock is at a positive inflection point into 2020, driven by 1) successful de-levering , 2) strong EPS growth of ~12%/29% in 2020/21E and 3) a tripling of ind. FCF to ~$2.3B in '20e led by Aviation & Healthcare. Power, Renewables and Corporate FCF drags should decline by ~$2B y/y with Gas Power becoming a cash contributor."

Credit Suisse upgraded Home Depot to 'outperform' from 'market perform'

Credit Suisse said the stock offers an "attractive" risk/reward.

"While we are early, we believe HD offers an attractive risk/reward now after its recent pullback (-11% since Q3 results), and yesterday's guidance reset, with optionality on improving external and internal drivers in FY20. Beyond that, we firmly believe in this team, and the initiatives aimed to expand its reach to new customer segments and categories, while leveraging its stores, building a differentiated omnichannel and digital experience, and creating the fastest delivery network that will widen its moat over time. Initial reads from these efforts seem positive."