Check out today's top analyst calls from around Wall Street, compiled by The Fly.
CHIPOTLE UPGRADED TO OUTPERFORM: William Blair analyst Sharon Zackfia upgraded Chipotle Mexican Grill (CMG) to Outperform from Market Perform without a price target. The 22% stock pullback in the past two weeks presents a buying opportunity, Zackfia tells investors in a research note.
BJ'S WHOLESALE UPGRADED, ADDED TO JPMORGAN'S FOCUS LIST: JPMorgan analyst Christopher Horvers upgraded BJ's Wholesale (BJ) to Overweight from Neutral with a price target of $29, up from $28. The analyst also added the shares to JPMorgan's Analyst Focus List as a value idea. Prior bullish investor expectations have largely turned to skepticism and the company's assortment optimization could yield accelerating comps, Horvers tells investors in a research note. The analyst also sees growth multiple potential on BJ's unit growth acceleration and views the stock's current valuation as attractive. BJ's offers a "near term port in the storm" with 84% of sales consumables and it should benefit from pantry loading, says Horvers.
LYFT INITIATED WITH A BUY: Needham analyst Brad Erickson initiated coverage of Lyft (LYFT) with a Buy rating and $48 price target. He thinks Lyft's 30% decline since the company's Q4 report, which attributes mostly to results and guidance and partially to coronavirus, has "created an unreasonably wide valuation discount" to competitor Uber (UBER) and the risk/reward looks favorable to him "for the first time" since Lyft came public, Erickson says.
Meanwhile, Piper Sandler analyst Alexander Potter reiterates an Overweight rating on Lyft with a $63 price target after his analysis showed the "striking impact of ride-hailing on Americans' transportation behavior." Ride-hailing has been negatively impacting auto sales, and if Lyft's recent commentary is any indication, this trend may actually accelerate in response to macro weakness, Potter says. Said differently, a "sputtering" macro backdrop may drive higher ride hailing utilization, contends the analyst. He believes this makes Lyft a potential beneficiary of any recession stemming from COVID-19.
RAYMOND JAMES DOWNGRADED TO EQUAL WEIGHT: Wells Fargo analyst Christopher Harris downgraded Raymond James (RJF) to Equal Weight from Overweight with a price target of $81, down from $102, citing the lower interest rate environment. While Raymond James has good business diversity, Harris says it is difficult for us to justify an Overweight rating given his expectation for more Fed rate cuts this year and negative EPS estimate revisions.
Separately, Wells Fargo's Harris revised price targets for the brokers group by an average of 22%, which incorporates reductions to both EPS estimates and applied valuation multiples. Of note, he lowered his price target for E-Trade (ETFC) to $45 from $56, for Interactive Brokers (IBKR) to $39 from $44, LPL Financial (LPLA) to $72 from $98, Stifel Financial (SF) to $56 from $71, TD Ameritrade (AMTD) to $38 from $53 and Charles Schwab (SCHW) to $38 from $52.
CITI INITIATES TRAVEL SPACE: Citi analyst Jason Bazinet initiated coverage of the online travel space with a skew towards Buy ratings. The online travel agencies -- Booking Holdings (BKNG), Expedia (EXPE) and Despegar.com (DESP) -- were started with Buy ratings. The business models of the OTAs are "sound," and prevailing multiples now command less than 15 times 2021 adjusted earnings forecasts, Bazinet tells investors in a research note. The analyst also initiated "pure play" meta search firm Trivago (TRVG) with a Buy rating citing its potential sale to Expedia. Meta search firms have reduced ad spending, which has resulted in slower top-line growth and smaller sequential OTA share gains in the overall travel market, contends Bazinet. The analyst also started TripAdvisor (TRIP) with a Neutral rating.
Chipotle
-28.8 (-3.95%)
BJ's Wholesale
+0.87 (+3.78%)
Lyft
-1.05 (-2.83%)
Uber
-1.28 (-3.97%)
Raymond James
-3.06 (-4.09%)
E-Trade
-1.46 (-3.40%)
Interactive Brokers
-1.89 (-3.93%)
LPL Financial
-0.6 (-0.91%)
Stifel Financial
-1.55 (-3.00%)
AMTD IDEA Group
-1.02 (-2.84%)
Charles Schwab
-0.9 (-2.59%)
Booking Holdings
-16.09 (-0.97%)
Expedia
-1.8 (-1.97%)
Despegar.com
+ (+0.00%)
Trivago
-0.09 (-5.17%)
TripAdvisor
+0.275 (+1.27%)