Here are Thursday's biggest analyst calls of the day: Nike, Apple, Shopify, Coinbase, Ford & more

Published Thu, Dec 16 20218:44 AM EST

Here are the biggest calls on Wall Street on Thursday: Evercore ISI upgrades Shopify to outperform from in line Evercore said in its upgrade of Shopify that the stock is "dislocated." "We are upgrading SHOP to Outperform with a $1770 PT based on four key opinions: 1) The Stock is Dislocated; 2) This is a High Quality Fundamentals Asset; 3) This is a High Quality Asset in terms of Growth Opportunities and Option Value." Goldman Sachs initiates coverage of RingCentral and Twilio as buy Beginning its coverage of RingCentral and Twilio , Goldman said that it likes the companies' "durable revenue growth rate." "We prefer businesses with platforms that can leverage increased brand awareness and revenue scale to drive multi-year durable revenue growth rate and margin upside (RNG, TWLO)." Wells Fargo downgrades Medtronic to equal weight from overweight Wells downgraded the stock due to concerns about slowing growth in the company's pipeline. "We are downgrading shares of MDT to Equal Weight from Overweight because of the recent setbacks and delays to four of MDT's key pipeline products, namely renal denervation (RDN), the Hugo soft tissue robot, the 780G insulin pump, and Linq 2." Morgan Stanley upgrades Toast to overweight from equal weight Morgan Stanley said in its upgrade of the restaurant cloud software company that it sees outperformance in 2022. " Toast's market share winning, end-to-end restaurant platform is well positioned for rapid scaling, w/ several powerful growth vectors & a conservative model, setting the table for outperformance. With healthy investor debate and the significant pullback, we like the setup into 2022." Citi names Goldman Sachs and Bank of America top 2022 picks Citi named several bank stocks as top picks for 2022 mainly on higher interest rate expectations. "Our top picks on higher rates are Buy-rated CMA, MTB, STT and BK and we are Buy-rated on BAC , TFC and USB; as well as GS /MS." Wells Fargo names Ford a top 2022 pick Wells Fargo named Ford a top pick in 2022 and said it sees the auto trade finally working next year. "After stalling out three times in 2021, we expect the auto recovery trade will finally start to work in 2022. Cumulatively ~39m vehicles have been lost due to the semi-supply shortage. This is ~40% of normal global production. It will likely take a half a decade to completely recover these lost sales. This bodes well for automakers and extremely well for auto suppliers." Stifel downgrades Under Armour to hold from buy Stifel said in its downgrade of Under Armour that it has "lower confidence" in revenue and margin upside. "We are reducing our 12 mos. TP to $24 from $30 and downgrading shares to Hold from Buy, reflecting lower confidence in potential for revenue and margin upside across FY23. Fundamental improvement potential through FY23E appears appropriately reflected in consensus margin expectations." Morgan Stanley downgrades Anaplan to equal weight from overweight Morgan Stanley said in its downgrade of software company Anaplan that it sees more "prolonged challenges." "Following Q3 earnings, our additional round of checks suggests recent results could be indicative of more prolonged challenges. Combined with investors' low confidence in management delivering beat/raise results, we think upside to the stock could be limited." Goldman Sachs reiterates Apple as neutral Goldman Sachs reiterated its neutral rating on shares of Apple and said it sees "solid demand" in China for the iPhone. "In our weekly update of lead time data for Apple, we note lead times down for iPhones across all major geographies indicating better supply/demand balance, in our opinion." Baird initiates coverage of Embark Technology as outperform Baird said it's bullish on autonomous trucking company Embark's long-term potential. "Initiating with an Outperform rating and $12 price target using our DCF. We are strong believers in the long-term potential of the autonomous vehicle market." Truist initiates coverage of Nike and Dick's Sporting Goods as buy Truist said it's bullish on Nike and Dick's Sporting Goods ' digital channels. "On the positive side: (1) the consumer is healthy; (2) the pull-forward in ecommerce adoption boosts margins for the global brands, while ironically cementing the importance of physical stores for traditional brick & mortar retailers." JPMorgan names Bank of America a top 2022 pick JPMorgan said the Bank of America should be a top beneficiary of higher interest rates. "We prefer the following names: Bank of America as a larger beneficiary of higher rates, US Bancorp for pickup in spending (notably airlines, travel) later in 2022 when COVID subsides, and PNC for other drivers, notably, merger cost savings near term, plus investing some of its large excess liquidity." Read more about this call here. Morgan Stanley upgrades AT & T to overweight from equal weight Morgan Stanley said in its upgrade of AT & T that it sees an "attractive" risk/reward. "We are upgrading AT & T to Overweight with a $28 price target (lowered from $32), as we believe that recent stock price underperformance has created an attractive risk reward opportunity, while we see a number of catalysts to unlock value by mid-2022." Read more about this call here. Bank of America initiates coverage of Robinhood as underperform Bank of America said that it's concerned about "decelerating growth potential" at the stock trading app company. "While we forecast strong growth in the future for HOOD, we estimate the stock valuation may be underappreciating several factors including: (1) the reversal of multiple Covid-19 related tailwinds (volatility, stimulus, bull market, remote work), (2) overstated growth trajectory in 2020-21 ("meme" stock phenomenon, crypto appreciation)." Read more about this call here. RBC downgrades Airbnb to sector perform from outperform RBC said in its downgrade of Airbnb that it sees a more balanced risk/reward. "With the risk/reward ultimately appearing too balanced at current levels to warrant the Outperform, we downgrade to Sector Perform." RBC upgrades Booking Holdings to outperform from sector perform RBC said in its upgrade of the online travel company that it has "underappreciated" profitability. "We believe a host of both positive industry and company developments combined with an expectations mismatch have created an opportunity in BKNG, prompting an upgrade to Outperform. In particular, 1) underappreciated structurally higher profitability vs. pre-pandemic, 2) minimal exposure to the subtle direct booking trend our U.S. property manager checks are detecting." Bank of America downgrades Wayfair to underperform from neutral Bank of America said in its downgrade of Wayfair that it sees too much weak near-term data. "We downgrade Wayfair to Underperform from Neutral and lower our PO to $175 (from $265) on a continuation of weak near-term data, tough comparisons through 1Q22 and our belief that there is risk from W's core mass consumer customer shifting spend from furnishings back into other categories such as travel and entertainment in 2022." Morgan Stanley downgrades DocuSign to equal weight from overweight Morgan Stanley downgraded the electronic signature agreement company due to concerns about slowing growth. "Q3 results from DOCU altered our thesis around the durability of growth through post-COVID tough comps. Although management is making the right moves to refocus on the pre-pandemic basics of selling, it likely takes time to build that pipeline and convert into growth." Mizuho reiterates Coinbase as neutral Mizuho said in a note to clients that Coinbase's market share could be a "leading indicator for Bitcoin prices." "Common sense tells us that changes in Bitcoin prices can influence trading behavior on the COIN platform. But is the opposite true too at times? Said differently: could changes in COIN's market share of Bitcoin prove to be a potential leading indicator for Bitcoin prices?" JPMorgan names Broadcom and Marvell top 2022 picks JPMorgan named several semiconductor stocks as top picks for 2022 and said they have solid 5G exposure. "We see semi stocks having 15- 20% upside from current levels over the next 12-18 months. Our top overall semiconductor picks are AVGO and MRVL, as both companies have strong cloud networking/compute acceleration semiconductor exposure and 5G infrastructure networking/compute exposure." Bank of America initiates coverage of Charles Schwab and BlackRock as buy Bank of America began coverage of Charles Schwab and BlackRock with a buy and said ETF managers are best positioned right now "We believe online brokers, exchanges (due to their technology, index, electronic fixed income and data/analytics businesses) and ETF managers are best-positioned (Buys = NDAQ, TW, BLK, IBKR, SCHW)." B Riley initiates coverage of Silvergate Capital as buy B Riley said the crypto bank has a "powerful first-mover advantage." " SI has created a valuable franchise that benefits from its first-mover advantage to create a 24/7 payments network for crypto customers. We expect the growing acceptance of crypto, including the SEC's approval of a futures ETF and the President's Working Group's push to include digital assets as part of the banking ecosystem, to support continued growth." Needham initiates coverage of Petco as buy Needham said it's bullish on Petco 's omni-channel footprint. "Shares declined by ~20% since 3Q21 print--near term gross margin pressure (driven primarily by mix shift to consumables) should ease starting 2Q22, while high % of own brands/exclusives is an asset in this supply chain backdrop." Needham initiates coverage of Wayfair as buy Needham said the online home goods store's stock is underappreciated. "A move into omni-channel with this month's opening of 3 W stores could be needle moving overtime with new customer acquisition and conversion and post purchase experience." Citi initiates coverage of Grab as buy Citi said that it sees multiple growth drivers for the Asian tech company heading into 2022. "Through its hyperlocal super app strategy, proprietary auto-dispatch/matching algorithms and advanced anti-fraud protections, supported by a large rider network and seamless payment mechanism, Grab aims to build a marketplace for Southeast Asia that serves and facilitates on-demand delivery and mobility services for local consumers and businesses." Morgan Stanley downgrades Walgreens Boots Alliance to underweight from equal weight Morgan Stanley said in a note to clients on Thursday that it's concerned about slowing growth and limited visibility for Walgreens Boots Alliance. "We now model no EPS growth through FY23 and have limited visibility into WBA' s emerging healthcare strategy. The contrast with CVS is stark – ability to invest in future growth without sacrificing earnings, CSuite healthcare expertise, and willingness to rationalize its retail footprint vs. WBA's status quo approach."

Shoppers wait in line to enter stores as Black Friday sales begin at The Outlet Shoppes of the Bluegrass in Simpsonville, Kentucky, November 26, 2021.

Jon Cherry | Reuters

Here are the biggest calls on Wall Street on Thursday: