Here are Wednesday's biggest analyst calls of the day: Tesla, Robinhood, Amazon, Ford, Apple & more

Published Wed, Sep 29 20218:32 AM EDTUpdated Wed, Sep 29 20219:16 AM EDT

Here are the biggest calls on Wall Street on Wednesday: Bernstein upgrades Boeing to outperform from market perform Bernstein said in its upgrade of the stock that it sees long term upside. " Boeing has more company-specific issues as it works to raise 737 MAX rates, return to 787 deliveries, and address program issues in defense. But, at the current share price, we believe there is sufficient upside long-term to justify an Outperform rating." Read more about this call here. Bank of America reiterates Ford as buy Bank of America said the automaker is just starting to hit a "sustainable inflection in earnings." "And despite the tough and volatile macroeconomic backdrop, we continue to believe Ford is just starting to hit a more sustainable inflection in earnings, driven by the combination of a favorable product cadence in the critical US/NA market and restructuring efforts with its Global Redesign program." Citi upgrades Eli Lilly to buy from neutral Citi said the recent sell-off in the stock is a buying opportunity. "We are upgrading LLY to Buy following > 15% sell-off and have increased our PT from $210 to $265. Our adjusted EPS forecasts are 2-20% above consensus." Read more about this call here. Cowen downgrades Lockheed Martin to market perform from outperform Cowen said in its downgrade of Lockheed that the stock faces an overhang heading into 2022. "We're cutting our rating to Market Perform for a PT of $375 and prefer GD (bizjet kicker) or NOC. … Also, if R & D tax credit amortization isn't changed, LMT may face a $2B cash flow hit in 2022, well above the level of peers." Morgan Stanley upgrades AutoNation to equal weight from underweight Morgan Stanley said it's bullish on the auto retailer's management changes. "We upgrade AutoNation to EW from UW and raise our price target to $116 from $70 previously. We see the appointment of Mike Manley (former CEO of FCA) as a significant narrative change." Wedbush reiterates Tesla as outperform Wedbush kept its outperform rating on the automaker and said it's bullish on the company's delivery numbers. "While logistics in Europe remain complex given most Model 3's/Y's are coming from Giga in China, we believe Tesla should approach potentially a ~230k delivery number in the quarter and handily beat our 212k estimate and early whisper numbers in the 220k range." Credit Suisse upgrades Conagra to neutral from underperform Credit Suisse said in its upgrade of the stock that it sees a more neutral risk/reward. "We are raising Conagra's rating to Neutral and raising our EPS estimate for FY22 to $2.48. We are now $0.02 above FactSet consensus but still below FY23 by $0.11. We view the risk-reward as neutral given that consensus already assumes an EPS miss in FY22 off of reduced earnings guidance and the valuation has dipped below its five-year average." Bernstein downgrades NXP Semiconductors to market perform from outperform Bernstein said in its downgrade of the semiconductor company that it has concerns about the auto industry, but the bank likes the stock long term. "Given we are growing somewhat uncomfortable especially with the auto trajectory, we are taking the chance to step to the sidelines on NXPI, and downgrade to Market-Perform (lowering TP to $230, no est changes)." Bank of America resumes Freeport-McMoRan as buy Bank of America reinstated coverage of the mining company and said copper fundamentals look strong. "After managing through a tricky period in Indonesia we see FCX' s risk profile as dramatically improved." Oppenheimer downgrades Morgan Stanley to perform from outperform Oppenheimer downgraded the stock on valuation. "We are downgrading Morgan Stanley to Perform based purely on valuation; forward estimates are largely unchanged, but our valuation model shows just 7% upside." Morgan Stanley names Alcoa a top pick Morgan Stanley said Alcoa is a key beneficiary of China's decarbonization policies. " AA is our Top Pick as we expect the company to benefit from a structural shift in the aluminum market, led by China's decarbonization policies (~5% of country's carbon emissions) and the 45Mt capacity cap leading demand to outpace supply by 2023." JPMorgan reiterates Robinhood as underweight JPMorgan kept its underweight rating on the stock and said it sees the shares coming under pressure as app usage has declined. "Significant amounts of Robinhood shares will be unlocked in the coming months, a normal course following an IPO, but a course that we see potentially further pressuring Robinhood's share price." Read more about this call here. JPMorgan downgrades HP to neutral from overweight JPMorgan downgraded the stock due to slowing PC sales. "We are downgrading HPQ to Neutral from OW, led by expectations for limited upside as the valuation multiple is unlikely to re-rate while investor concerns relative to PC industry volumes persist, which we do not necessarily see dissipating near term despite our view for a more subdued moderation in PC industry volumes from the 2020/2021 record volumes." Evercore ISI upgrades Occidental Petroleum to outperform from in line Evercore said in its upgrade of Occidental that the stock has "commodity and financial leverage with liquidity." "We view the stock as an attractive way to play the next leg in the energy upcycle with windfall commodity prices set to flatter free cash generation and the balance sheet over the next 2 and likely more quarters." Bank of America reiterates Amazon as buy Bank of America said it's bullish on Amazon after the company debuted its latest products at its fall event on Tuesday. "We believe Amazon should have potential competitive advantages in smart home AI and robotics, stemming from its retail fulfilment and cloud businesses, and we maintain our Buy rating." Bank of America reiterates Apple as neutral Bank of America restated its neutral rating on Apple and said it's concerned shipment times for the newest iPhone could be "stretched out." "The unintended consequence of a faster high end replacement dynamic creates a large secondary market of extremely new and capable used iPhones that can ultimately create pressure on primary (new) iPhone sales." KeyBanc reiterates Netflix as overweight KeyBanc kept its overweight rating on the streaming giant and said the company's content slate is resonating with subscribers. "Netflix co-CEO Ted Sarandos's expanded disclosure of viewership metrics — and comment that Squid Game is on pace to be Netflix's most popular original ever — dovetails with improved app rankings in recent weeks in international markets." UBS reiterates Microsoft as buy UBS said consensus estimates may be too conservative on shares of Microsoft. "If anything, Microsoft seems to be tempering GM (gross margin) expectations, citing a mix shift to Azure and 'ongoing strategic investments', offset by continued improvement in overall Cloud GMs as well as improving Gaming GMs as the hardware console mix declines. … Bottom line, we conclude that the Street outlook feels conservative enough and that the downside risk to Street margin estimates to FY22 is modest. Bank of America reiterates Lucid Group as buy Bank of America restated its call that Lucid is the "Tesla/Ferrari" of new electric vehicle automakers. "Our Buy rating on LCID is predicated on our view that the company is one of the most viable among the universe of start-up electric vehicle (EV) automakers and also a relative competitive threat to the universe of incumbent automakers." Evercore ISI reiterated Chipotle as outperform Evercore raised its price target on the Mexican food restaurant chain to $2,200 from $1,950 and said "higher returns warrant a higher multiple." " Chipotle' s remarkable loyalty membership has almost tripled since late 2019—now at 24M vs. 8.5M in late 2019. This equates to ~8,000 loyalty members per store—even more than Domino's ~6,000 per location."

Ford Motor Co. CEO Jim Farley walks to speak at a news conference at the Rouge Complex in Dearborn, Michigan, September 17, 2020.

Rebecca Cook | Reuters

Here are the biggest calls on Wall Street on Wednesday: