Here are Thursday's biggest analyst calls: Tesla, Apple, Roku, Peloton, Plug Power, Target & more

Published Thu, Jan 26 20238:55 AM EST

Here are the biggest calls on Wall Street on Thursday: Bank of America downgrades NextEra Energy to neutral from buy Bank of America downgraded the renewables company after a key executive announced his departure from the company. "The overwhelming majority of our inbound investor questions were cautious on NextEra , not willing to buy with shares declining -9% and finishing at the lows of the day." Piper Sandler initiates coverage of Albemarle as overweight Piper said in its initiation of the lithium company that it sees "sharp" earnings increases. "ALB EBITDA Growth Driven Almost Exclusively By Lithium Markets. In effect, ALB is basically a lithium pure play on a going forward basis. D.A. Davidson reiterates Apple as buy D.A. Davidson said it's sticking with its buy rating heading into Apple's earnings next week. "For Apple's December-quarter earnings, we are focusing on two things. One, that the company is slowly starting to accelerate its efforts to diversify its supply chain, so that it is less reliant on China. Two, our thesis is that the impact that the Chinese government's COVID-zero policy had on Apple resulted in iPhone sales shifting to the March quarter, rather than being lost." Jefferies reiterates Alphabet as buy Jefferies said Alphabet's multiple is near a "15-year trough," which makes for an attractive risk/reward. "Expect GOOGL stock to rebound ahead of revs as it did during '08-'09 great financial crisis." Goldman Sachs reiterates Tesla as buy Goldman said it likes Tesla's "strong orders at lower prices" after the company's earnings report on Wednesday. "Importantly, Tesla commented that since it lowered prices it has seen the strongest orders year-to-date in its history, with orders running about 2X production. While we believe this rate of orders may not be sustained in light of the weak macroeconomic environment, it would suggest the company is tracking well to our 1.8 mn delivery estimate." Read more about this call here. JPMorgan downgrades EVgo to neutral from overweight JPMorgan said in its downgrade of the electric vehicle charging company that it sees slowing growth. "In addition, we downgrade EVGO from OW to N on our expectations for slower growth and higher capital intensity compared to our prior expectation." Read more about this call here UBS downgrades Pfizer to neutral from buy UBS said in its downgrade of the stock that it sees a lack of products in Pfizer's pipeline. "Downgrade to Neutral on COVID headwinds + pipeline not quite ready for prime time." Read more about this call here. Citi initiates coverage of Match as neutral Citi initiated coverage of the dating app company with a neutral rating and said it sees too much uncertainty. " Match Group does have multiple potential catalysts, and valuation levels that are as attractive as they've been since 2019, but we initiate coverage on the sidelines as Match currently has multiple new initiatives that are too early for us to get a feel for." Jefferies reiterates Amazon as buy Jefferies said it's staying bullish heading into Amazon 's earnings next week. "Expect margin recovery to unfold in 1Q, though we see a more muted recovery in the 1H23 vs. consensus." Deutsche Bank downgrades Union Pacific to hold from buy and upgrades Norfolk Southern to buy from hold Deutsche downgraded Union Pacific and said it's disappointed with the company's execution. The firm also said in its upgrade of Norfolk Southern that it has "more confidence in our NSC estimates given recent execution trends." "It's possible for our estimates to prove overly optimistic, but we also think the opportunity for rail volumes to exhibit acyclicality is underappreciated against a backdrop of high fuel prices and improving service. In the context of all these considerations, including management execution, we are upgrading shares of NSC to Buy (from Hold) and downgrading shares of UNP to Hold." Deutsche Bank downgrades Nasdaq to hold from buy Deutsche said in its downgrade of the markets and financials company that it sees a more "challenging" 2023. "We think 2023 will become a considerably more challenging year for NDAQ than previously anticipated, due to 1) a higher expense growth trajectory than expected, 2) slower recurring revenue growth in several Solutions business due mostly to an extension of sales cycles." William Blair downgrades ViaSat to market perform from outperform William Blair downgraded the satellite company and said it sees a more balanced risk/reward. "We are downgrading our rating on shares of ViaSat to Market Perform. Following the stock's 18% return versus the S & P 500's 5% gain to start 2023, we think there is equal risk/reward." Bank of America reiterates Peloton as buy Bank of America said it's bullish on Peloton heading into earnings next week. "Expect modest upside on subs and churn. … We are looking for a message of modest subscriber growth, stable/improving q/q churn, and traction toward positive cash flows in FY'24 on the call." Morgan Stanley reiterates Plug Power as overweight The firm said it likes Plug's "winning" green hydrogen strategy. "We retain our OW-rating at this time, as we believe PLUG has a winning long-term green hydrogen strategy." Cantor Fitzgerald initiates coverage of Datadog as buy Cantor initiated coverage of the cloud-scale software company. The firm said Datadog is well positioned to navigate the "secular tailwinds in digital transformation." "We are initiating coverage at Overweight and price target of $95 on Datadog a leader in end-to-end cloud observability that seeks to bring the same success into the adjacent security market." Bernstein reiterates Target as outperform Bernstein said buying shares of Target is "great value on a long-term winner." "But we believe the worst is decidedly behind us; we fully expect gross (and op) margin to recover through FY23 - FY24. EPS will rebound ~75% in FY23, and another 20% in FY24." JPMorgan reiterates Uber as a top pick JPMorgan said it's bullish heading into the ride-sharing company's earnings on Feb. 8. "We believe UBER' s rideshare business provides a hedge vs. slowing food growth, & we expect the company to continue to deliver incremental margins at or above its 7% benchmark." Needham reiterates Roku as buy Needham said it's bullish on Roku's decision to build its own TV. "Because Roku is the operating system (OS) for dozens of TV hardware makers (ie, OEMs), Roku knows which features are used most across its 70mm active accounts. Roku can build these features into best-in-class TVs, thereby accelerating new user growth, we believe."