Here are Thursday’s biggest calls on Wall Street: Morgan Stanley reiterates Tesla as overweight Morgan Stanley said it’s bullish heading into the company’s investor day on March 1. “It is very possible that Tesla’s March 1st investor day may have greater significance on the market’s perception (and ultimately, valuation) for Tesla’s EV competitors than for Tesla itself.” JPMorgan downgrades Centene to neutral from overweight JPMorgan downgraded the health care company mainly on valuation. “We are updating our rating on CNC to Neutral from Overweight. Our ratings revision is primarily a function of JPM’s relative ratings system. At < 10x 2024 adj. EPS, we believe CNC’s current valuation sufficiently discounts near-term MA challenges and Medicaid reprocurement risk.” BTIG downgrades Wingstop to neutral from buy BTIG said it’s concerned about slowing growth for shares of Wingstop. “Top and Bottom-Line Growth Continues, but 30% Run Year-to-Date Makes Us Less Enthusiastic; Downgrading to Neutral.” Bank of America reiterates Target as neutral Bank of America said it sees “modest upside” at current levels. “We reiterate our Neutral as we believe TGT’s strong omni-channel positioning and discount store decade exposure will likely be overshadowed by discretionary pressures.” Morgan Stanley upgrades Intel to equal weight from underweight Morgan Stanley said it sees a more balanced risk/reward for Intel shares. “Speculation about dividend reduction has been painful for the stock, but it’s the right thing to do. With material underperformance YTD and in late 2022, and this negative catalyst out of the way, we see balanced risk reward, and upgrade to EW.” Loop initiates Walgreens Boots Alliance as buy Loop said in its initiation note that it sees major upside for shares of the drug store chain. “Over the past two years the company has also lowered its costs and assembled a portfolio of health care providers that we expect to strengthen WBA’ s core retail business and accelerate its growth and profitability by increasing its engagement with consumers.” Read more about this call here. SVB Securities upgrades Teladoc to outperform from market perform SVB said investors should buy the dip in shares of the telehealth company. “Upgrade to OP as bear thesis fully reflected in shares, forward arc looks achievable. We are upgrading TDOC from MP to OP, and fully acknowledge that the call will be met with a high level of pushback given the quarter’s miss in both FY23 and 1Q23 guidance.” Deutsche Bank upgrades Dun & Bradstreet to buy from hold Deutsche said it sees a favorable risk/reward for shares of the business analytics company. ” Dun & Bradstreet’s investor day and product demos helped clarify the company’s value proposition to us – and following a -17% price decline last week amidst a 4Q earnings miss and lower guide – we see risk/reward as asymmetrically favorable for a largely recurring revenue business model.” Bank of America downgrades Lucid Group to neutral from buy Bank of America said it’s concerned about slowing demand for the luxury vehicle company. “We are downgrading LCID to Neutral from Buy and lower our PO to $10 from $18. Given 4Q:22 results, the light 2023 outlook, and lower than expected 2023 production forecast (10k-14k) we are materially lowering our 2023 estimates.” Needham initiates Clear Secure as buy Needham said it’s bullish on shares of the biometric security company. “We are initiating coverage of CLEAR Secure, Inc . with a Buy rating and a $40 PT given our belief the company can grow its biometric identity platform well beyond its current enrollment of 14mm+ individuals.” Bank of America reiterates Nvidia as buy Bank of America said Nvidia remains “best-in-class” after its earnings report on Wednesday. “Reiterate Buy, top compute pick, raise FY24/25 EPS by 10%/2% to $4.42/$5.83, with importantly total sales forecast to accelerate to a 23%+ annual run-rate from CY24E (calendar year), best-in-class.” Read more about Nvidia here . Credit Suisse upgrades Cinemark to neutral from underperform Credit Suisse said Street expectations appear more reasonable for the movie theater company. “With 4Q22’s soft U.S. Box Office effectively in the rear-view mirror, we update our film-by-film tracking for 2023 and find Street expectations for Cinemark are now reasonable, at least for 1H23.” Berenberg downgrades BP to hold from buy Berenberg downgraded BP mainly on valuation. “We view the update as positive from a shareholder perspective, but we believe the company’s strategy is now more closely aligned to peers – while its valuation has moved to a premium.” UBS downgrades AppLovin to neutral from buy UBS downgraded the mobile tech software company over too much macro uncertainty. “We are downgrading APP from Buy to Neutral & reducing our PT to $16. While we believe AppLovin’s software business is well positioned to benefit from growth in the app economy, we believe macro uncertainty, measured ad spend and lower visibility limits upside to shares.” Bank of America reiterates CVS as buy Bank of America said it sees “significant free cash flow generation potential” for CVS. “But the fundamental swing factors are now complemented by the proposed Oak Street transaction, which would provide CVS with its long-awaited initial foray into primary care within the Medicare Advantage market.” Oppenheimer downgrades Unity Software to perform from outperform Oppenheimer downgraded the video game software company due to macro uncertainty. “While management’s more conservative outlook further de-risks 2023 expectations, we believe Unity’s valuation multiple has sufficiently accounted for updated revenue growth and margin profiles. We move to the sidelines while we watch for more evidence of mobile ad market recovery and U’ s expansion among nongaming enterprise customers.” UBS reiterates Apple as buy UBS said it’s sticking with its buy rating on the stock after Apple filed a patent for a flexible display. “While our preliminary checks do not incorporate a smartphone or any other Apple product with a flexible display or a ‘fold’, we believe a flexible display patent, while applicable to multiple products, more likely applies to smartphones in our view.” Oppenheimer reiterates Microsoft as outperform Oppenheimer said it’s standing by shares of the tech giant. “Powerful interests likely will continue pressuring Microsoft and OpenAI, as artificial intelligence is the platform of platforms, with high stakes.” Goldman Sachs reiterates Salesforce as buy Goldman said shares of Salesforce are at an “inflection point.” “We reiterate our Buy and raise our PT to $310 as we believe CRM is at an inflection point that can vault it into the upper echelons of highly valued tech companies.” Citi reiterates Snowflake as buy Citi said the cloud computing data company is an under-the-radar beneficiary of A.I. “Despite concerns around weaker cloud consumption models + optimizations, we remain buyers of SNOW.”
