Here are Thursday’s biggest calls on Wall Street: Morgan Stanley reiterates Salesforce as overweight Morgan Stanley said it sees “durable growth” for Salesforce following earnings on Wednesday. “We continue to view GenAI as a tailwind for Salesforce, with benefits likely coming in CY25, but at these levels, GenAI represents a call option.” Bank of America reiterates Nvidia as buy Bank of America said it’s sticking with the stock following earnings. “Our positive view on Nvidia is based on its underappreciated transformation from a traditional PC graphics chip vendor, into a supplier into high-end gaming, enterprise graphics, cloud, accelerated computing and automotive markets.” Barclays upgrades Foot Locker to overweight from equal weight Barclays said the retailer is “inflecting back to growth.” “We are upgrading shares of FL on the back of 2Q24 which evidenced several fundamental inflections including: 1) a return to sustainable positive comps; 2) inflection in merchandise margins; 3) ongoing improvement in the sales-to-inventory spread; and 4) increased full price selling in the US market.” Bank of America reiterates CrowdStrike as buy Bank of America said the impact of the global IT outage was better than feared on the company’s earnings report on Wednesday. “We favor CrowdStrike’s best-in-class subscription growth and net retention rates and expect the company’s Software as a Service (SaaS) model and new offerings to deliver sustainable high growth as the company invests to gain market share.” Barclays initiates Nuvalent as overweight Barclays said the biotech company is well positioned. “We initiate coverage of Nuvalent with an OW rating ahead of multiple value-inflecting data readouts in 2H24 and 2025.” Citi reiterates Broadcom as buy The firm said it’s bullish ahead of earnings next week. “Expect AVGO to Beat and Raise on AI Strength and VMWare Accretion Again.” Morgan Stanley downgrades Cava to equal weight from overweight Morgan Stanley raised its price target on the stock to $110 per share from $90 but said it’s downgrading Cava on valuation. “We still like the story and see upward estimate revisions as likely, but this seems well anticipated, and under the valuation framework we’ve been using, we no longer have upside to our base PT (now $110).” JPMorgan adds Abercrombie & Fitch to the focus list JPM added Abercrombie & Fitch to the focus list following earnings. “Put together, we see continued beat/raise opportunity over the balance of the year, with 2H same-store- sales prudently set to moderate by more than 1,000bps on a 1-yr basis despite continued broad-based momentum across brands, channels, and geographies…” Bernstein upgrades Marriott to outperform from market perform Bernstein said Marriott’s valuation is compelling. “We also catalysts for this to unwind as it offers more upside on H2 estimates, and the roll out of midscale growth and tech into 2025 and beyond.” Citi names Apple a top pick into 2025 Citi said the tech giant is a new top pick over Nvidia and Arista heading into 2025. “We expect iPhone 16 ‘It’s Glowtime’ product launch on Sep 9 to further highlight AI phone experience. We move AAPL to our top AI pick above NVDA & ANET going into 2025 to align with our AI investing framework.” William Blair initiates Tesla as outperform William Blair said its outperform rating on the stock is driven by the company’s energy opportunity. “We view Tesla Energy as the most underappreciated component of the Tesla story and expect the narrative will shift toward the energy storage business in light of tempered EV expectations in the near term.” William Blair initiates GE Vernova as outperform William Blair said GE Vernova is the “largest beneficiary of shift back to natural gas.” “We believe GE Vernova is best positioned to benefit as the energy sector reverts back to pragmatism and quietly walks back from the 100% green idealism.” Redburn Atlantic Equities initiates Take-Two as buy Redburn said it’s bullish on shares of the video game maker. “Take-Two is approximately a year away from releasing Grand Theft Auto VI, the next iteration in what is by far the world’s most successful crime video game franchise, and in a genre where the company dominates.” Jefferies initiates Reynolds as buy Jefferies said it sees cash returns in store for the consumer products company. ” Reynolds is the market leader across a series of daily-use household goods. Its notably high market share and vertical integration provide a competitive advantage, evidenced by share gains.” Morgan Stanley upgrades Eni to overweight from equal weight Morgan Stanley said the Italian oil and gas company is a new top pick. “Eni – balance sheet improvement ahead; upgrade to Overweight, new Top Pick.” Bank of America downgrades Okta to underperform from buy Bank of America double downgraded the identity and access management company following earnings. “We have an Underperform rating on Okta as we believe headwinds to growth, including customer cost optimization and SMB [small midsize business] weakness, will continue to persist over the next 12 months, which will likely pressure the stock.” JPMorgan downgrades Kohl’s to underweight from neutral JPMorgan said it sees too many negative catalysts for the stock following earnings. “From 2014-24E, under 3 different CEOs, KSS has attempted to ‘re-invent’ the store box with different traffic-driving initiatives, including AMZN free- returns, Planet Fitness, Aldi, BOPIS, Activewear expansion, Smart Cart, Sephora.” Citi adds a positive catalyst watch on JetBlue The firm said the airline is levered to lower interest rates. It said it’s sticking with its long term neutral rating. “Although refinancing opportunities in the next 30 days seem unlikely, September’s US FOMC meeting might at least provide the market, with more of a path towards lower, long-term net interest expense for JetBlue and other highly levered carriers.” Morgan Stanley reiterates Dell as overweight Morgan Stanley lowered its price target on the stock to $136 per share from $142 but said it’s sticking with its overweight rating. “In the last 24 hours we learned that DELL is seeing some AI server project delays, indicating CY24/FY25 AI Server builds are now at 37-38k (vs. 48k previously). To be clear, we are not hearing of cuts/share losses, just delays.”
