Berkshire Hathaway pod vedením Grega Abela zvýšila podíl ve společnosti Lennar na 10 % a dokončila akvizici společnosti Taylor Morrison Home za 6,8 miliardy USD.
Mortgage rates are rising, making it harder for people to afford a home. The housing market has been stalled for quite some time, as affordability issues existed even before mortgage rates began rising. This is a terrible backdrop for homebuilders like Lennar (LEN -0.54%). And yet, Berkshire Hathaway (BRKA +0.71%)(BRKB +0.80%), under new CEO Greg Abel, has been buying that stock, building its position to 10%, and it recently completed its $6.8 billion acquisition of Taylor Morrison Home. Is this a costly early misstep?
Greg Abel is doing things his way
Housing has long been a part of conglomerate Berkshire Hathaway's business. The company has a deep knowledge of the sector, which tends to be cyclical. The company's housing exposure was originally built under former CEO Warren Buffett. So Greg Abel isn't exactly charting his own course with his investments in home builders.
Image source: Getty Images.
Greg Abel's big departure from Buffett is that he has explicitly stated that Taylor Morrison Home will eventually be integrated with other Berkshire Hathaway businesses to create a larger division. Buffett usually allowed companies under the Berkshire umbrella to operate independently. But there's a similarity between Buffett and Abel that's important when it comes to housing: Buffett often bought stocks and entire companies when they were unloved. The housing market is deeply unloved today, with Lennar stock down 40% from its 52-week high.
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If you were looking to buy housing companies on the cheap, now might be a good time since the rest of Wall Street appears to hate them. There are good reasons for that investor concern, but you often find the best values in an industry when it is facing hard times.
A housing mistake or an opportunistic, long-term investment
Right now, with mortgage rates rising and housing stocks falling, it is easy to see why investors would consider Abel's housing investments an early misstep. But that's a short-term view, while Berkshire Hathaway has long viewed investing as a long-term endeavor. That was Buffett's approach, and Abel's housing push suggests it is his approach, as well. Buy when others are fearful, as the old saying goes, and then hold for the long term.
Basically, it is too soon to tell if Abel has made a mistake. But before you pass judgment, you may want to ask yourself a simple question: Are people going to stop living in houses? The logical answer is no, which suggests that there will eventually be a housing recovery in what is a traditionally cyclical industry. And Berkshire Hathaway clearly plans to be there to benefit when the current downturn ends.
NVIDIA zahájila výrobu platformy Vera Rubin, která má při škálování nabídnout desetinásobnou propustnost pro AI agenty ve srovnání s platformou Grace Blackwell. Ve třetím čtvrtletí fiskálního roku 2027 by měla tvořit přibližně 20 % tržeb datových center.
Key Takeaways NVIDIA has begun Vera Rubin production, targeting 10 times Grace Blackwell's agent throughput at scale.NVDA expects Vera Rubin to contribute about 20% of Data Center revenues in the third quarter of fiscal 2027.Major cloud providers are preparing deployments, but supply bottlenecks may persist through fiscal 2028.
NVIDIA Corporation’s (NVDA - Free Report) Vera Rubin platform could extend its lead in the artificial intelligence (AI) market by delivering greater computing performance and efficiency for increasingly complex AI workloads. Production of this next-generation platform has started, giving NVIDIA another opportunity to strengthen its position as businesses expand AI infrastructure.
The platform combines Rubin GPUs (graphics processing units), Vera CPUs (Central Processing Units), networking, storage and other components into integrated systems designed for large-scale AI factories. NVIDIA claims Vera Rubin can deliver 10 times the agent throughput of its previous Grace Blackwell platform at scale. Its production network spans more than 350 factories across 30 countries.
The growth opportunity is substantial. In the second quarter of fiscal 2027, NVIDIA’s revenues increased 106% year over year to $96.2 billion, while Data Center revenues climbed 117% to $89 billion. Management expects third-quarter revenues of $108 billion, plus or minus 2%, and anticipates Vera Rubin will contribute about 20% of Data Center revenues in the quarter.
Major cloud providers, including CoreWeave, Alphabet, Microsoft, Oracle and Nebius, are preparing to deploy the platform. These partnerships could help NVIDIA capture demand for AI agents that perform multi-step tasks, increasing the need for computing power.
Vera Rubin strengthens NVIDIA’s growth outlook. However, supply constraints could limit its ability to meet demand, while rising memory costs could pressure margins. Management expects supply to remain a bottleneck through at least fiscal 2028.
NVIDIA’s Rivals Advance Their AI Chip PlatformsAdvanced Micro Devices, Inc. (AMD - Free Report) is challenging NVIDIA with its Instinct GPUs and Helios rack-scale systems. AMD’s second-quarter 2026 revenues rose 50% year over year to $11.54 billion, while Data Center sales jumped 107% to $6.72 billion.
Advanced Micro Devices also plans to supply up to 2 gigawatts of MI450 GPUs to Anthropic, with the first deployment expected in the first half of 2027. This could make AMD a stronger alternative as customers seek more AI computing capacity.
Intel Corporation (INTC - Free Report) is also expanding its data-center business. Its second-quarter 2026 revenues rose 25% year over year to $16.13 billion, supported by demand for its processor products.
Intel is investing in its CPU, advanced packaging and manufacturing capabilities to capture more AI infrastructure spending. However, NVIDIA’s integrated GPU systems, networking and software ecosystem remain important advantages.
Advanced Micro Devices’ upcoming MI450 platform and Intel’s processor business offer customers more choices. Still, NVIDIA’s Vera Rubin ramp could help it maintain its lead if it delivers the promised performance and scales production smoothly.
NVIDIA’s Price Performance, Valuation and EstimatesShares of NVIDIA have risen around 21.3% year to date, underperforming the Zacks Computer and Technology sector’s gain of 23.4%.
NVIDIA YTD Price Return Performance
Image Source: Zacks Investment Research
From a valuation standpoint, NVDA trades at a forward price-to-earnings ratio of 16.60, below the sector’s average of 20.93.
NVIDIA Forward 12-Month P/E Ratio
Image Source: Zacks Investment Research
The Zacks Consensus Estimate for NVIDIA’s fiscal 2027 and 2028 earnings implies a year-over-year increase of approximately 93.9% and 68%, respectively. Estimates for fiscal 2027 and 2028 have been revised upward over the past 60 days.
Image Source: Zacks Investment Research
NVIDIA currently sports a Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy). You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank stocks here.
NVIDIA ve 2. čtvrtletí fiskálního roku 2027 zvýšila tržby meziročně o 105,8 % na 96,22 miliardy USD a ve 3. čtvrtletí očekává tržby ve výši 108 miliard USD.
NVIDIA's revenue is growing triple digits and analysts keep raising their targets, yet a closer look at supply constraints, export bans, and rising customer payment delays reveals how much uncertainty surrounds every dollar invested today.
A $1,000 investment in NVIDIA (NASDAQ:NVDA | NVDA Price Prediction) starts from a assumed price of $230.48, and the shares recently traded near $229.47. This piece looks at what that stake could be worth by 2030.
NVIDIA is worth a long look because management expects revenue to grow about 70% next fiscal year, while the stock trades at about 46 times trailing earnings.
What $1,000 Could Become by 2030
The headline assumes 10% growth a year. The model’s central scenario is nearly the same, working out to 10.68% a year.
Its longest forecast runs to October 8, 2031, so every firm number below uses that five-year date. Under its central projection, a $1,000 investment could be worth about $1,660.70 by 2031, a total return of 66.07%. That assumes a share price of $382.76.
There are two rough markers for 2030 itself, and both are estimates taken from outside the model’s targets. On its projected path, the stock reaches $371.92 on October 8, 2030.
At that price, $1,000 would be worth about $1,613.68, a gain of roughly 61.37%. If you simply grow $1,000 by exactly 10% a year for four years, you get $1,464.10.
Bull, Base and Bear Paths for Your $1,000
Scenario
Price Target (2031)
Total Return
Annualized Return
Value of $1,000
Bull
$485.85
110.8%
16.08%
$2,108
Base
$382.76
66.07%
10.68%
$1,660.70
Bear
$269.95
17.12%
3.21%
$1,171.20
The one-year base target is $270.72, an upside of 17.46%. That would turn $1,000 into about $1,174.60. The one-year bull and bear targets are $315.68 and $233.76. Its forecast has a confidence score of 0.9, rated high; its automated label, Buy, is not advice. Analysts are more upbeat. Analysts’ consensus target is $328.72. Ratings break down as 10 Strong Buys, 48 Buys, 2 Holds and 1 Sell.
Three Growth Drivers Behind the Base Case
Demand Is Running Ahead of Supply
Second-quarter fiscal 2027 revenue was $96.22 billion, up 105.8% from a year earlier. Data Center sales were $89.02 billion. Guidance for the third quarter is $108 billion. Management says its roughly 70% growth outlook for fiscal 2028 is held back by supply.
Chief executive Jensen Huang said on the earnings call: “At this moment, we have supply for 70%. We have more supply than 70%, but about 70%. Our demand is much higher than that.”
Vera Rubin Brings In More Revenue per Gigawatt
Every new chip generation makes NVIDIA more per gigawatt of data-center capacity. Blackwell brings in $25 billion per gigawatt and Vera Rubin $40 billion per gigawatt. Customers are also spending more.
The five largest cloud providers are expected to spend nearly $800 billion on capital projects in 2026 and $1.3 trillion in 2027 (that expansion runs well beyond NVIDIA, which is why we rounded up seven infrastructure suppliers riding the same wave in a free AI infrastructure report).
Earnings Estimates Keep Rising
Analysts expect fiscal 2028 earnings of $15.6951 per share. Over the past 30 days, 46 analysts raised their estimates and 0 cut them.
The model’s own forward P/E is about 18. It also cuts its outlook for very large companies like NVIDIA, which is why its central projection looks modest next to the company’s growth rate.
Risks That Could Shrink Your Returns
China: Guidance leaves out all China Data Center compute revenue because of export restrictions.
Commitments: NVIDIA has $279B in supply commitments and $108.5B in guarantees to AI cloud partners. Both depend on demand holding up.
Slower payments: Customers are taking longer to pay. Days sales outstanding rose to 60 days from 45.
Margins: Gross margin is expected to bottom in the fourth quarter at 71% to 72% as memory costs rise. NVIDIA also depends on Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing (NYSE:TSM) to make its chips.
Volatility: The stock’s beta of 2.22 means it tends to swing much more than the overall market. AI stocks, NVIDIA included, recently fell on a report about OpenAI’s revenue.
Even so, the worst scenario still leaves $1,000 at $1,171.20. A deeper AI spending slowdown could push results below every scenario shown here.
What This Means for Your $1,000
A $1,000 NVIDIA stake is estimated at $1,171.20 to $2,108 by late 2031, with a base case of $1,660.70.
Any figure for 2030 is a rough marker taken from that path. These scenarios has no guarantees. They depend on AI demand surviving supply limits and geopolitical risk. It is a projection, not investment advice.
Contact [email protected] for any questions or corrections.
Amazon is reportedly closing in on a $7 billion deal for a startup with barely 100 employees and no disclosed revenue, and the real prize has nothing to do with the flashy video models everyone is talking about.
Amazon (NASDAQ:AMZN | AMZN Price Prediction) is reported to be in talks to pay around $7 billion for Decart, a company with about 100 employees and no disclosed revenue. The talks were reported on October 11, 2026, and no deal had been announced as of October 12, 2026. Amazon and Decart both declined to comment, and the deal could still fall apart or draw another bidder.
Amazon shares closed at $259.53 on October 12, a session move of -1.11%, so the market did not treat the reported talks as an obvious win. The price only makes sense if you value Decart as a way to move AI developers off Nvidia (NASDAQ:NVDA) software, which is worth far more to Amazon than its video models.
Two Businesses Inside One Small Startup Decart’s visible business is real-time generative video. Its Oasis model generates interactive worlds, and Lucy edits live video as it plays.
The second business is the Decart Optimization Stack. It is software that makes AI models run faster and cheaper on Nvidia GPUs, Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL) TPUs, and Amazon’s Trainium chips without rebuilding the model for each chip. That’s what Amazon would most likely pay for if the talks lead to a deal.
Nvidia’s CUDA software, the programming layer most AI models are written and tuned for, is the main reason developers stay on Nvidia hardware, and Amazon has built Trainium for years, but getting customers to port their models has proven harder than building the chip.
Amazon became a Decart strategic customer in May 2026. Chief executive Dean Leitersdorf has said Trainium3 runs Decart’s models at half the cost of GPUs, a claim the company made about its own results.
A Small Price for a $2.80 Trillion Company Against Amazon’s $2.80 trillion market value, the reported price is small. Amazon spent $54.2 billion on capital expenditures (data centers and equipment) in the second quarter of 2026 alone.
Its chips business passed a $25 billion annualized revenue run rate that quarter. If Decart’s software could shift even a small share of AI workloads onto Trainium, the saved Nvidia margin could cover the reported price.
A Rival Looked at Decart and Walked Away Anthropic reportedly considered a Decart deal at about $6 billion in August and walked away after due diligence in September. A sophisticated buyer passed at a lower price than the one now being discussed, for reasons that went unreported.
Decart has not disclosed revenue, and the only outside estimate puts it at several tens of millions of dollars. That would make the reported price a very high multiple of Decart’s sales.
The reported figure is about 75% higher than the May 2026 round, which raised $300 million led by Radical Ventures. An earlier round valued Decart at $3.1 billion.
Nvidia is also a Decart investor, which complicates the idea that a deal would be a move against Nvidia, and nothing reported explains how the price splits between video and optimization, as there has been no announcement, no disclosed terms, and no regulatory filing.
What the Decart Talks Mean for Amazon’s Investment Case The Decart talks change little about Amazon’s investment case. That case rests on AWS revenue of $42.2 billion, up 36.7% year over year in the second quarter, plus a backlog of $496 billion.
The stock trades at a forward P/E of 24x. The average analyst target of $331.53 stands well above the October 12 close, which suggests analysts expect AWS growth to have the shares regardless of Decart.
If the talks produce a deal, Decart would give Trainium useful software support. If they collapse, Amazon would still have its existing customer relationship with Decart, so the downside for shareholders looks limited.
Watch whether Amazon announces a signed agreement before its next earnings report and whether it discloses Trainium adoption figures on that call. No deal and no new Trainium customers would weaken the case that Trainium can compete with Nvidia.
Contact [email protected] for any questions or corrections.
Walmart se obchoduje za očekávané P/E 36,32, což je nad průměrem odvětví 32,73, zatímco globální tržby z e-commerce ve 2. čtvrtletí fiskálního roku 2027 vzrostly o 23 %.
Key Takeaways Walmart trades at 36.32X forward earnings, above the industry's 32.73X. Global e-commerce sales jumped 23% in Q2, while higher-margin businesses fuel Walmart's growth. Rising fuel costs and pricing investments pressure margins, favoring a cautious approach to WMT stock. Walmart Inc. (WMT - Free Report) continues to command a premium valuation, reflecting investors' confidence in its resilient business model, expanding digital capabilities and improving profitability. However, the stock's elevated valuation raises questions about whether its growth prospects justify the premium.
WMT is currently trading at a forward 12-month price-to-earnings (P/E) multiple of 36.32, exceeding the industry average of 32.73 and its five-year median of 25.20. This premium reflects investors' expectations of sustained earnings growth and successful execution of Walmart's omnichannel strategy. However, the elevated valuation also leaves limited room for earnings disappointments or operational setbacks.
Image Source: Zacks Investment Research
Walmart also trades at a substantially higher valuation than Target Corporation (TGT - Free Report) and Dollar General Corporation (DG - Free Report) , which currently command forward P/E multiples of 15.78 and 15.32, respectively. Meanwhile, Costco Wholesale Corporation (COST - Free Report) commands an even richer valuation at 41.55, highlighting the varying premiums investors are willing to pay for leading retailers.
What's Driving Walmart's Growth Momentum?Walmart's growth momentum is supported by its ability to combine everyday low prices with digital convenience, operational efficiency and expanding higher-margin businesses. Its extensive store network, competitive pricing and broad merchandise assortment continue to attract customers across income groups. The company's emphasis on affordability remains particularly relevant as consumers prioritize value amid ongoing economic pressures. Continued market share gains, especially in grocery and essential categories, highlight the resilience of its business model.
E-commerce remains a key growth catalyst, supported by faster fulfillment, marketplace expansion and increasing digital adoption. Walmart is leveraging its physical footprint to integrate stores with online operations, enabling convenient pickup and faster deliveries while improving fulfillment efficiency. Global e-commerce sales increased 23% in second-quarter fiscal 2027, underscoring sustained demand for its omnichannel offerings. Expanding delivery capabilities are also strengthening customer engagement and encouraging repeat purchases.
Walmart's growing ecosystem of higher-margin businesses, including advertising, marketplace services and membership programs, is another important strength. Walmart Connect, its third-party marketplace, and Walmart+ are creating additional revenue opportunities beyond traditional retail sales. These businesses are improving profitability, diversifying revenue streams and reinforcing customer loyalty.
Continued investments in automation, artificial intelligence and supply-chain modernization are enhancing productivity and inventory management. Walmart International and Sam's Club provide additional growth opportunities through digital expansion, membership gains and improving market penetration. Together, these initiatives support Walmart's competitive positioning and long-term earnings potential.
How Has WMT Stock Performed Against Its Peers?Shares of Walmart have gained 5.5% over the past year, outperforming the broader industry's 2.8% growth and the Zacks Retail – Wholesale sector's modest rise of 0.2%.
Image Source: Zacks Investment Research
However, the company has underperformed several prominent retail peers like Target and Dollar General while outpacing Costco. Over the past year, TGT and DG have delivered gains of 72.7% and 22%, respectively. Meanwhile, COST has advanced 1.4%, trailing WMT. The mixed performance suggests that although Walmart's fundamentals remain solid, its premium valuation has not translated into market-leading stock appreciation. Sustained earnings momentum may be necessary to justify further upside.
Walmart’s Near-Term ChallengesDespite its long-term strengths, Walmart faces several near-term challenges that could pressure profitability. Elevated fuel costs, aggressive pricing investments and rising operating expenses remain key concerns. Management expects more than $2 billion in incremental fuel-related costs in fiscal 2027, creating additional pressure on distribution and fulfillment expenses.
Walmart's focus on affordability, while supporting market share gains, could weigh on near-term margins. The company implemented more than 11,000 price rollbacks during the second quarter. Tariff-related refunds significantly benefited quarterly profitability, raising questions about the sustainability of the reported growth rate. Management expects third-quarter adjusted operating income growth of 2-4% in constant currency, reflecting continued price investments.
Higher depreciation, self-insurance costs and employee healthcare expenses also contributed to operating expense deleverage. Meanwhile, Walmart U.S. comparable sales growth moderated to 2.6%, partly due to pharmacy-related deflation associated with maximum fair price regulations. These pressures, combined with a premium valuation, could limit near-term stock upside.
What Do Earnings Estimates Indicate for WMT?The Zacks Consensus Estimate for Walmart's current fiscal-year earnings per share has remained unchanged at $2.87 over the past 30 days, implying year-over-year growth of 8.7%. Similarly, the consensus estimate for the next fiscal year has held steady at $3.22, suggesting growth of nearly 12%.
Image Source: Zacks Investment Research
Should Investors Buy, Hold or Sell Walmart Stock Now?Walmart's strong market position, expanding digital ecosystem and growing higher-margin businesses provide a solid foundation for sustained growth. Its emphasis on affordability, convenience and operational efficiency continues to strengthen its competitive advantage. However, the elevated valuation, mixed stock performance and near-term cost pressures suggest that much of the optimism is already priced in. While Walmart remains fundamentally attractive, its current risk-reward profile favors a cautious approach. Existing shareholders may consider retaining their positions, while prospective investors could await a more favorable entry point.
WMT currently carries a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold). You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here.
Akcionáři Procter & Gamble na valné hromadě schválili všech 12 kandidátů do představenstva, auditora i odměňování vrcholového vedení a zamítli tři akcionářské návrhy.
Does Lemonade’s Growth Signal Profits Ahead?Procter & Gamble NYSE: PG shareholders elected all 12 director nominees and approved the company’s auditor appointment and executive compensation plan at the company’s 2026 annual meeting, while rejecting three shareholder proposals.
Shailesh Jejurikar, P&G’s chairman, president and chief executive officer, said the company delivered organic sales and core earnings-per-share growth within its initial guidance ranges despite what he described as a volatile geopolitical, macroeconomic and consumer environment.
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The September Scramble: Find Sanctuary in These 3 Defensive Dividend StocksFor the fiscal year, P&G reported organic sales growth of more than 1% and 1% growth in core earnings per share. On a currency-neutral basis, core EPS was in line with the prior year. Adjusted free cash flow productivity was 100%, Jejurikar said.
The company said top-line performance improved sequentially, with organic sales growth moving from one point in the first half of the year to two points in the second half. Nine of 10 product categories and all geographic regions held or increased organic sales during the year, while aggregate global value and volume share trends improved in the second half and exited the year roughly flat.
These 3 Stock Charts Just Flashed the Dreaded Death Cross PatternP&G returned more than $15 billion to shareholders during the fiscal year, including more than $10 billion in dividends and $5 billion in share repurchases, Jejurikar said. The company increased its dividend 3%, marking its 70th consecutive annual dividend increase and its 136th consecutive year of dividend payments.
Dividend Declaration and Voting Results The board declared a quarterly dividend of $1.0885 per share, payable on or after Nov. 16, 2026, to common shareholders of record at the close of business on Oct. 23, 2026. Preferred shareholders of record at the start of business on Oct. 23 will also receive the dividend.
Shareholders approved the election of directors, ratified Deloitte & Touche LLP as P&G’s independent registered public accounting firm, and approved the company’s advisory “Say on Pay” vote on executive compensation.
Three shareholder proposals failed:
A proposal from The Accountability Board seeking to lower the ownership threshold for shareholders to call a special meeting to 15% from 25%. A National Legal and Policy Center proposal seeking a policy to maintain existing eligibility thresholds for shareholders submitting proposals, regardless of potential regulatory changes. A Bahnsen Family Trust proposal requesting annual reporting on charitable contributions. P&G’s board had recommended votes against each shareholder proposal. Susan Whaley, P&G’s chief legal officer and secretary, said final voting results would be reported in a Form 8-K filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.
Strategy, Innovation and Portfolio Expansion Jejurikar said P&G does not view its recent relative performance as requiring a change in its core strategy. Instead, he said the company is adapting its execution to respond to media fragmentation, changes in the retail landscape and the cumulative impact of inflation.
The company identified four execution interventions: building a deeper consumer-first mindset, transforming brand-building to reduce the path from awareness to purchase, developing holistic retailer partnerships, and pursuing a “stronger core and bigger more” approach to brands and innovation.
Jejurikar cited North American laundry as an example, saying P&G upgraded Tide product lines while launching Tide evo detergent tiles and continuing innovation on Downy Unstopables beads. He said the company is also using connected consumer data to generate insights and accelerate technology development.
Chief Financial Officer Andre Schulten said P&G does not currently foresee a stock split. He said fractional-share investing has made P&G shares accessible at a range of prices, while a stock split would not change the company’s fundamental value and could add administrative costs.
Jejurikar also discussed P&G’s recent acquisition of Thorne, describing the performance and wellness brand as a strategic opportunity in beauty and health. He said Thorne has a loyal consumer base, a portfolio of vitamins, minerals and supplements, healthcare-professional endorsements, attractive margins and a strong top-line growth profile.
Tariffs, Manufacturing and Sustainability Jejurikar said the net impact of tariffs in fiscal 2026 was a $250 million pretax cost, included within a $1.2 billion commodity, foreign-exchange and interest headwind. He said the situation involving Canadian tariffs continued to evolve and that the company would provide more detail during its earnings call later in the month.
The CEO said more than 85% of products P&G sells in the U.S. are made in the U.S. Manufacturing locations are selected based on proximity to consumers and customers, raw-material availability, capacity and cost, he said.
On packaging, Jejurikar said 80% of P&G consumer packaging is designed to be recyclable or reusable, compared with 55% in 2018. The company has reduced virgin petroleum plastic use in consumer packaging by 24% versus 2018, he said, while noting that further progress depends partly on broader supply-chain and recycling infrastructure.
Jejurikar said P&G is applying artificial intelligence in consumer insights, brand building, innovation, supply-chain operations and everyday work. He characterized AI as an “amplifier of human potential” and said the company is focused on helping employees develop skills for an AI-enabled future.
About Procter & Gamble (NYSE:PG)The Procter & Gamble Company NYSE: PG is a consumer products company that develops, manufactures and markets branded products used in households and personal care routines. Its portfolio includes products in categories such as beauty, grooming, health care, fabric and home care, and family care.
Major brands associated with Procter & Gamble include Pampers, Tide, Gillette, Head & Shoulders, Pantene, Oral-B, Crest, Olay, Old Spice, Febreze, Mr. Clean, Swiffer and Bounty. The company sells its products through retailers, e-commerce platforms and other distribution channels.
Founded in Cincinnati, Ohio, in 1837 by William Procter and James Gamble, the company has grown into a global consumer goods business serving customers in markets around the world.
This instant news alert was generated by narrative science technology and financial data from MarketBeat in order to provide readers with the fastest reporting and unbiased coverage. Please send any questions or comments about this story to [email protected].
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NorthCrest Asset Manangement LLC increased its position in shares of Johnson & Johnson (NYSE:JNJ – Free Report) by 6.5% during the third quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the SEC. The firm owned 173,177 shares of the company’s stock after buying an additional 10,574 shares during the period. Johnson & Johnson comprises about 1.0% of NorthCrest Asset Manangement LLC’s portfolio, making the stock its 15th biggest position. NorthCrest Asset Manangement LLC’s holdings in Johnson & Johnson were worth $44,416,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.
Several other hedge funds have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Silver Coast Investments LLC grew its holdings in Johnson & Johnson by 3.8% during the 2nd quarter. Silver Coast Investments LLC now owns 1,066 shares of the company’s stock worth $271,000 after acquiring an additional 39 shares in the last quarter. Townsend Asset Management Corp NC ADV boosted its holdings in shares of Johnson & Johnson by 0.6% in the 2nd quarter. Townsend Asset Management Corp NC ADV now owns 6,418 shares of the company’s stock valued at $1,630,000 after buying an additional 39 shares in the last quarter. Triumph Capital Management raised its stake in Johnson & Johnson by 1.6% during the 2nd quarter. Triumph Capital Management now owns 2,531 shares of the company’s stock worth $643,000 after acquiring an additional 39 shares in the last quarter. Kwmg LLC raised its stake in Johnson & Johnson by 1.7% during the 3rd quarter. Kwmg LLC now owns 2,383 shares of the company’s stock worth $631,000 after acquiring an additional 39 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Denali Advisors LLC lifted its position in Johnson & Johnson by 1.2% in the second quarter. Denali Advisors LLC now owns 3,305 shares of the company’s stock valued at $839,000 after acquiring an additional 40 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 69.55% of the company’s stock.
Analyst Ratings Changes Several equities analysts have issued reports on the stock. TD Cowen upped their price objective on shares of Johnson & Johnson from $250.00 to $300.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Monday, July 13th. Weiss Ratings raised Johnson & Johnson from a “buy (b)” rating to a “buy (b+)” rating in a research report on Thursday. Wells Fargo & Company raised their price target on Johnson & Johnson from $272.00 to $282.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Monday, August 3rd. Guggenheim reaffirmed a “buy” rating and set a $287.00 price target on shares of Johnson & Johnson in a research report on Wednesday, October 7th. Finally, Stifel Nicolaus set a $260.00 price target on Johnson & Johnson in a research report on Wednesday, July 15th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, eighteen have given a Buy rating and six have issued a Hold rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $276.22.
Check Out Our Latest Stock Report on Johnson & Johnson Johnson & Johnson News Summary Here are the key news stories impacting Johnson & Johnson this week:
Positive Sentiment: Q3 earnings beat and higher guidance: Johnson & Johnson topped analysts’ expectations for the third quarter and increased its 2026 adjusted EPS outlook, signaling stronger operating momentum across its focused portfolio. Earnings Snapshot: Johnson & Johnson tops Q3 expectations, lifts full-year adjusted EPS guidance Positive Sentiment: Dividend reaffirmed: The board declared a quarterly cash dividend of $1.34 per share, payable December 8 to shareholders of record November 24. The payment reinforces JNJ’s income appeal and marks another distribution in the company’s long record of dividend increases. Johnson & Johnson Announces Quarterly Dividend for Fourth Quarter 2026 Positive Sentiment: TREMFYA data supports pharmaceutical growth: New Phase 3 Crohn’s disease data showed sustained clinical and endoscopic remission through three years, with additional analyses demonstrating consistent fistula-remission results across difficult-to-treat patient groups. The findings could strengthen confidence in TREMFYA as JNJ manages Stelara-related biosimilar pressure. TREMFYA demonstrated sustained remission through three years Neutral Sentiment: Potential MedTech restructuring: CFO Joseph Wolk said JNJ is leaning toward spinning out its hips-and-knees business. A separation could sharpen management focus and unlock value, but execution risks and the impact on the remaining MedTech portfolio are not yet clear. J&J Is Leaning Toward Spinning Out Its Hips-And-Knees Business Negative Sentiment: MedTech weakness: Surgery revenue declined in the latest quarter, prompting the company to work on improving performance in its medical-device business. This offsets some of the strength from pharmaceuticals and could limit near-term upside. Negative Sentiment: Legal risk: Boston Scientific sued JNJ subsidiary Atraverse Medical over alleged patent infringement involving a cardiology device. An adverse outcome could restrict sales of the contested product, though the financial impact is currently uncertain. Is Johnson & Johnson Facing New MedTech Risk After a Patent Lawsuit? Insider Activity In other news, EVP Vanessa Broadhurst sold 23,054 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Monday, July 20th. The shares were sold at an average price of $251.27, for a total value of $5,792,778.58. Following the completion of the sale, the executive vice president owned 23,003 shares in the company, valued at approximately $5,779,963.81. This trade represents a 50.06% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through this hyperlink. Also, EVP Timothy Schmid sold 33,597 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, September 2nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $274.74, for a total transaction of $9,230,439.78. Following the transaction, the executive vice president owned 25,447 shares in the company, valued at approximately $6,991,308.78. This trade represents a 56.90% decrease in their ownership of the stock. Additional details regarding this sale are available in the official SEC disclosure. Insiders have sold a total of 87,569 shares of company stock worth $23,064,544 over the last quarter. Insiders own 0.16% of the company’s stock.
Johnson & Johnson Stock Performance Shares of JNJ stock opened at $264.01 on Tuesday. The stock’s 50-day moving average price is $266.01 and its 200 day moving average price is $249.31. The company has a quick ratio of 0.81, a current ratio of 1.09 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.44. The stock has a market capitalization of $636.23 billion, a PE ratio of 30.59, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.65 and a beta of 0.21. Johnson & Johnson has a 52-week low of $184.66 and a 52-week high of $281.07.
Johnson & Johnson (NYSE:JNJ – Get Free Report) last released its earnings results on Wednesday, July 15th. The company reported $2.90 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.84 by $0.06. Johnson & Johnson had a return on equity of 32.42% and a net margin of 21.48%. The business had revenue of $25.31 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $25.06 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the company posted $2.77 earnings per share. The company’s revenue for the quarter was up 6.6% compared to the same quarter last year. Johnson & Johnson has set its FY 2026 guidance at 11.600-11.750 EPS. As a group, equities research analysts forecast that Johnson & Johnson will post 11.18 EPS for the current year.
Johnson & Johnson Announces Dividend The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Tuesday, September 8th. Shareholders of record on Tuesday, August 25th were given a dividend of $1.34 per share. The ex-dividend date was Tuesday, August 25th. This represents a $5.36 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 2.0%. Johnson & Johnson’s dividend payout ratio is presently 62.11%.
Johnson & Johnson Company Profile (Free Report)
Johnson & Johnson (NYSE: JNJ) is a global healthcare company that develops, manufactures and markets products through two primary business segments: Innovative Medicine and MedTech. Its operations serve patients, healthcare professionals and consumers in markets around the world.
The Innovative Medicine segment focuses on prescription medicines in areas including immunology, oncology, neuroscience, cardiovascular and metabolic disease, infectious diseases, and pulmonary hypertension.
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United Airlines očekává za čtvrtletí končící v září 2026 zisk na akcii ve výši 2,68 USD, což představuje meziroční pokles o 3,6 %, při tržbách 17,84 miliardy USD, meziročně vyšších o 17,2 %.
United Airlines (UAL - Free Report) is expected to deliver a year-over-year decline in earnings on higher revenues when it reports results for the quarter ended September 2026. This widely-known consensus outlook gives a good sense of the company's earnings picture, but how the actual results compare to these estimates is a powerful factor that could impact its near-term stock price.
The earnings report, which is expected to be released on October 20, might help the stock move higher if these key numbers are better than expectations. On the other hand, if they miss, the stock may move lower.
While the sustainability of the immediate price change and future earnings expectations will mostly depend on management's discussion of business conditions on the earnings call, it's worth handicapping the probability of a positive EPS surprise.
Zacks Consensus EstimateThis airline is expected to post quarterly earnings of $2.68 per share in its upcoming report, which represents a year-over-year change of -3.6%.
Revenues are expected to be $17.84 billion, up 17.2% from the year-ago quarter.
Estimate Revisions TrendThe consensus EPS estimate for the quarter has been revised 44.35% lower over the last 30 days to the current level. This is essentially a reflection of how the covering analysts have collectively reassessed their initial estimates over this period.
Investors should keep in mind that the direction of estimate revisions by each of the covering analysts may not always get reflected in the aggregate change.
Price, Consensus and EPS Surprise
Earnings WhisperEstimate revisions ahead of a company's earnings release offer clues to the business conditions for the period whose results are coming out. Our proprietary surprise prediction model -- the Zacks Earnings ESP (Expected Surprise Prediction) -- has this insight at its core.
The Zacks Earnings ESP compares the Most Accurate Estimate to the Zacks Consensus Estimate for the quarter; the Most Accurate Estimate is a more recent version of the Zacks Consensus EPS estimate. The idea here is that analysts revising their estimates right before an earnings release have the latest information, which could potentially be more accurate than what they and others contributing to the consensus had predicted earlier.
Thus, a positive or negative Earnings ESP reading theoretically indicates the likely deviation of the actual earnings from the consensus estimate. However, the model's predictive power is significant for positive ESP readings only.
A positive Earnings ESP is a strong predictor of an earnings beat, particularly when combined with a Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy), 2 (Buy) or 3 (Hold). Our research shows that stocks with this combination produce a positive surprise nearly 70% of the time, and a solid Zacks Rank actually increases the predictive power of Earnings ESP.
Please note that a negative Earnings ESP reading is not indicative of an earnings miss. Our research shows that it is difficult to predict an earnings beat with any degree of confidence for stocks with negative Earnings ESP readings and/or Zacks Rank of 4 (Sell) or 5 (Strong Sell).
How Have the Numbers Shaped Up for United?For United, the Most Accurate Estimate is higher than the Zacks Consensus Estimate, suggesting that analysts have recently become bullish on the company's earnings prospects. This has resulted in an Earnings ESP of +0.17%.
On the other hand, the stock currently carries a Zacks Rank of #5.
So, this combination makes it difficult to conclusively predict that United will beat the consensus EPS estimate.
Does Earnings Surprise History Hold Any Clue?Analysts often consider to what extent a company has been able to match consensus estimates in the past while calculating their estimates for its future earnings. So, it's worth taking a look at the surprise history for gauging its influence on the upcoming number.
For the last reported quarter, it was expected that United would post earnings of $1.92 per share when it actually produced earnings of $1.99, delivering a surprise of +3.65%.
Over the last four quarters, the company has beaten consensus EPS estimates four times.
Bottom LineAn earnings beat or miss may not be the sole basis for a stock moving higher or lower. Many stocks end up losing ground despite an earnings beat due to other factors that disappoint investors. Similarly, unforeseen catalysts help a number of stocks gain despite an earnings miss.
That said, betting on stocks that are expected to beat earnings expectations does increase the odds of success. This is why it's worth checking a company's Earnings ESP and Zacks Rank ahead of its quarterly release. Make sure to utilize our Earnings ESP Filter to uncover the best stocks to buy or sell before they've reported.
United doesn't appear a compelling earnings-beat candidate. However, investors should pay attention to other factors too for betting on this stock or staying away from it ahead of its earnings release.
Stay on top of upcoming earnings announcements with the Zacks Earnings Calendar.
ExxonMobil těží z cen ropy WTI nad 90 USD za barel díky nízkonákladové těžbě v Permské pánvi a v Guyaně; odhady zisku na rok 2026 za posledních 30 dní vzrostly.
Key Takeaways ExxonMobil's low-cost Permian and Guyana operations position it to benefit from elevated crude oil prices.XOM is using advanced drilling techniques and AI to boost Permian production volumes while lowering costs.XOM shares gained 53.3% in a year, outperforming the industry, while its 2026 earnings estimates rose.
West Texas Intermediate (“WTI”) crude is currently trading above $90 per barrel according to data from Oilprice.com. Although the commodity price recently declined from the high mark of more than $100 per barrel, the pricing environment of the commodity is still favorable to continue supporting ExxonMobil Holdings Corporation’s (XOM - Free Report) exploration and production activities, which generate the majority of its earnings.
XOM has a massive footprint in the Permian, the most prolific oil and gas play in the United States, and offshore Guyana. In the Permian, the integrated giant has been employing new drilling techniques and artificial intelligence to boost and optimize production volumes at lower cost structures.
In Guyana, XOM has made several oil and gas discoveries, further highlighting its solid production outlook. Robust production from both assets has been aiding its top and bottom lines. In both resources, the breakeven costs are low.
Will CVX & COP Also Gain From High Oil Prices?Like XOM, Chevron Corporation (CVX - Free Report) and ConocoPhillips (COP - Free Report) will benefit from the strength in oil prices. Let’s delve a little deeper.
With COP generating a significant proportion of revenues from crude oil, the high price of the commodity is extremely favorable for the leading oil and gas exploration and production company, much like other energy giants such as XOM and CVX.
The upstream energy giant also has low-cost drilling opportunities across the Permian, Eagle Ford and Bakken that could be successfully developed over two decades. Thus, the outlook for ConocoPhillips’ upstream operations looks bright.
Chevron has been witnessing growth in production volumes, thanks to its footprint in the Permian. CVX is thus well-poised to gain from prevailing high oil prices.
XOM’s Price Performance, Valuation & EstimatesShares of XOM have gained 53.3% over the past year compared with the industry’s growth of 49.5%.
Image Source: Zacks Investment Research
From a valuation standpoint, XOM trades at a trailing 12-month enterprise value to EBITDA (EV/EBITDA) of 9.59X. This is above the broader industry average of 6.06X.
Image Source: Zacks Investment Research
The Zacks Consensus Estimate for XOM’s 2026 earnings has seen upward revisions over the past 30 days.
Image Source: Zacks Investment Research
ExxonMobil currently carries a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold). You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here.
General Motors očekává za čtvrtletí zisk na akcii (EPS) ve výši 3,52 USD, což představuje meziroční nárůst o 25,7 %, při tržbách 47,59 miliardy USD, tedy meziročně nižších o 2,1 %.
General Motors (GM - Free Report) is expected to deliver a year-over-year increase in earnings on lower revenues when it reports results for the quarter ended September 2026. This widely-known consensus outlook gives a good sense of the company's earnings picture, but how the actual results compare to these estimates is a powerful factor that could impact its near-term stock price.
The earnings report, which is expected to be released on October 20, might help the stock move higher if these key numbers are better than expectations. On the other hand, if they miss, the stock may move lower.
While the sustainability of the immediate price change and future earnings expectations will mostly depend on management's discussion of business conditions on the earnings call, it's worth handicapping the probability of a positive EPS surprise.
Zacks Consensus EstimateThis an automotive manufacturer is expected to post quarterly earnings of $3.52 per share in its upcoming report, which represents a year-over-year change of +25.7%.
Revenues are expected to be $47.59 billion, down 2.1% from the year-ago quarter.
Estimate Revisions TrendThe consensus EPS estimate for the quarter has been revised 0.21% lower over the last 30 days to the current level. This is essentially a reflection of how the covering analysts have collectively reassessed their initial estimates over this period.
Investors should keep in mind that the direction of estimate revisions by each of the covering analysts may not always get reflected in the aggregate change.
Price, Consensus and EPS Surprise
Earnings WhisperEstimate revisions ahead of a company's earnings release offer clues to the business conditions for the period whose results are coming out. Our proprietary surprise prediction model -- the Zacks Earnings ESP (Expected Surprise Prediction) -- has this insight at its core.
The Zacks Earnings ESP compares the Most Accurate Estimate to the Zacks Consensus Estimate for the quarter; the Most Accurate Estimate is a more recent version of the Zacks Consensus EPS estimate. The idea here is that analysts revising their estimates right before an earnings release have the latest information, which could potentially be more accurate than what they and others contributing to the consensus had predicted earlier.
Thus, a positive or negative Earnings ESP reading theoretically indicates the likely deviation of the actual earnings from the consensus estimate. However, the model's predictive power is significant for positive ESP readings only.
A positive Earnings ESP is a strong predictor of an earnings beat, particularly when combined with a Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy), 2 (Buy) or 3 (Hold). Our research shows that stocks with this combination produce a positive surprise nearly 70% of the time, and a solid Zacks Rank actually increases the predictive power of Earnings ESP.
Please note that a negative Earnings ESP reading is not indicative of an earnings miss. Our research shows that it is difficult to predict an earnings beat with any degree of confidence for stocks with negative Earnings ESP readings and/or Zacks Rank of 4 (Sell) or 5 (Strong Sell).
How Have the Numbers Shaped Up for General Motors?For General Motors, the Most Accurate Estimate is higher than the Zacks Consensus Estimate, suggesting that analysts have recently become bullish on the company's earnings prospects. This has resulted in an Earnings ESP of +1.22%.
On the other hand, the stock currently carries a Zacks Rank of #3.
So, this combination indicates that General Motors will most likely beat the consensus EPS estimate.
Does Earnings Surprise History Hold Any Clue?Analysts often consider to what extent a company has been able to match consensus estimates in the past while calculating their estimates for its future earnings. So, it's worth taking a look at the surprise history for gauging its influence on the upcoming number.
For the last reported quarter, it was expected that General Motors would post earnings of $3.13 per share when it actually produced earnings of $3.57, delivering a surprise of +14.06%.
Over the last four quarters, the company has beaten consensus EPS estimates four times.
Bottom LineAn earnings beat or miss may not be the sole basis for a stock moving higher or lower. Many stocks end up losing ground despite an earnings beat due to other factors that disappoint investors. Similarly, unforeseen catalysts help a number of stocks gain despite an earnings miss.
That said, betting on stocks that are expected to beat earnings expectations does increase the odds of success. This is why it's worth checking a company's Earnings ESP and Zacks Rank ahead of its quarterly release. Make sure to utilize our Earnings ESP Filter to uncover the best stocks to buy or sell before they've reported.
General Motors appears a compelling earnings-beat candidate. However, investors should pay attention to other factors too for betting on this stock or staying away from it ahead of its earnings release.
Stay on top of upcoming earnings announcements with the Zacks Earnings Calendar.
Verizon Communications (VZ - Free Report) is one of the stocks most watched by Zacks.com visitors lately. So, it might be a good idea to review some of the factors that might affect the near-term performance of the stock.
Over the past month, shares of this largest U.S. cellphone carrier have returned -16.6%, compared to the Zacks S&P 500 composite's +2.1% change. During this period, the Zacks Wireless National industry, which Verizon falls in, has gained 3.1%. The key question now is: What could be the stock's future direction?
While media releases or rumors about a substantial change in a company's business prospects usually make its stock 'trending' and lead to an immediate price change, there are always some fundamental facts that eventually dominate the buy-and-hold decision-making.
Revisions to Earnings EstimatesHere at Zacks, we prioritize appraising the change in the projection of a company's future earnings over anything else. That's because we believe the present value of its future stream of earnings is what determines the fair value for its stock.
Our analysis is essentially based on how sell-side analysts covering the stock are revising their earnings estimates to take the latest business trends into account. When earnings estimates for a company go up, the fair value for its stock goes up as well. And when a stock's fair value is higher than its current market price, investors tend to buy the stock, resulting in its price moving upward. Because of this, empirical studies indicate a strong correlation between trends in earnings estimate revisions and short-term stock price movements.
For the current quarter, Verizon is expected to post earnings of $1.28 per share, indicating a change of +5.8% from the year-ago quarter. The Zacks Consensus Estimate has changed +0.5% over the last 30 days.
For the current fiscal year, the consensus earnings estimate of $5.04 points to a change of +7% from the prior year. Over the last 30 days, this estimate has changed +0.1%.
For the next fiscal year, the consensus earnings estimate of $5.29 indicates a change of +5% from what Verizon is expected to report a year ago. Over the past month, the estimate has changed +0.1%.
Having a strong externally audited track record, our proprietary stock rating tool, the Zacks Rank, offers a more conclusive picture of a stock's price direction in the near term, since it effectively harnesses the power of earnings estimate revisions. Due to the size of the recent change in the consensus estimate, along with three other factors related to earnings estimates, Verizon is rated Zacks Rank #3 (Hold).
The chart below shows the evolution of the company's forward 12-month consensus EPS estimate:
12 Month EPS
Projected Revenue GrowthEven though a company's earnings growth is arguably the best indicator of its financial health, nothing much happens if it cannot raise its revenues. It's almost impossible for a company to grow its earnings without growing its revenue for long periods. Therefore, knowing a company's potential revenue growth is crucial.
For Verizon, the consensus sales estimate for the current quarter of $34.8 billion indicates a year-over-year change of +2.9%. For the current and next fiscal years, $140.94 billion and $143.86 billion estimates indicate +2% and +2.1% changes, respectively.
Last Reported Results and Surprise HistoryVerizon reported revenues of $34.25 billion in the last reported quarter, representing a year-over-year change of -0.7%. EPS of $1.3 for the same period compares with $1.22 a year ago.
Compared to the Zacks Consensus Estimate of $35.31 billion, the reported revenues represent a surprise of -3%. The EPS surprise was +2.36%.
The company beat consensus EPS estimates in each of the trailing four quarters. The company topped consensus revenue estimates just once over this period.
ValuationWithout considering a stock's valuation, no investment decision can be efficient. In predicting a stock's future price performance, it's crucial to determine whether its current price correctly reflects the intrinsic value of the underlying business and the company's growth prospects.
Comparing the current value of a company's valuation multiples, such as its price-to-earnings (P/E), price-to-sales (P/S), and price-to-cash flow (P/CF), to its own historical values helps ascertain whether its stock is fairly valued, overvalued, or undervalued, whereas comparing the company relative to its peers on these parameters gives a good sense of how reasonable its stock price is.
As part of the Zacks Style Scores system, the Zacks Value Style Score (which evaluates both traditional and unconventional valuation metrics) organizes stocks into five groups ranging from A to F (A is better than B; B is better than C; and so on), making it helpful in identifying whether a stock is overvalued, rightly valued, or temporarily undervalued.
Verizon is graded A on this front, indicating that it is trading at a discount to its peers. Click here to see the values of some of the valuation metrics that have driven this grade.
Bottom LineThe facts discussed here and much other information on Zacks.com might help determine whether or not it's worthwhile paying attention to the market buzz about Verizon. However, its Zacks Rank #3 does suggest that it may perform in line with the broader market in the near term.
Šéf Goldman Sachs David Solomon před volbami v polovině volebního období očekává politickou volatilitu kolem výstavby datových center pro AI; rostoucí potřeby financování a tlak na úrokové sazby mohou ovlivnit návratnost a životaschopnost některých projektů.
Goldman Sachs (GS.N) CEO David Solomon said on Tuesday it would be interesting to watch for political volatility around AI centers ahead of midterm elections.
Speaking at an analysts' call for quarterly earnings, he also said as the financing needs for AI projects grow and there is pressure on rates, it could affect the returns and the viability of certain projects.
"Localized political volatility around data centers. You know, we've got an election coming up. It'll be interesting to see," Solomon said.
"Obviously there's a lot of political discussion coming into an election, but then you also have to see how states and localities act coming out of elections. All these things can create you know volatility, and there's uncertainty around them."
Data centers, which provide the computing power needed to train and run AI models, have faced growing opposition from communities across the United States.
Residents have raised concerns about their rising electricity demand, the potential for higher utility bills and other environmental impacts on local communities.
The artificial intelligence buildout is on track to require a larger share of U.S. output than the rollout of electricity, railroads, interstate highways or the internet, with an increasingly complicated financial structure that poses potentially systemic risks, according to a new study.
The expansion will consume around 3.6% of gross domestic product annually through 2032, or more than $10 trillion, and is using ever more intricate financing arrangements, Stijn Van Nieuwerburgh, a finance and real estate professor at Columbia Business School, wrote in a paper prepared for a Brookings Institution conference last month.
"There's going to be infrastructure built around it that's going to be quite significant," Goldman's Solomon.
"But we feel very well positioned to bring the full range of services and participate actively, and we still see an enormous amount of activity."
Goldman is a financial partner with Nvidia (NVDA.O), which in August announced it has partnered with six major financial institutions to launch compute platforms aimed at raising over $500 billion in third-party capital for AI infrastructure.
Srovnatelné tržby McDonald’s v USA ve druhém čtvrtletí 2026 vzrostly jen o 0,8 %. Firma posílí personalizované digitální nabídky a marketing cenově výhodných menu.
Key Takeaways McDonald's U.S. comparable sales rose 0.8% in Q2 2026, falling short of expectations.Weak FIFA campaign, low offer awareness and fewer digital deals drove two-thirds of the traffic shortfall.McDonald's plans personalized digital offers, more value-meal spending and a focused marketing calendar.
McDonald’s Corporation (MCD - Free Report) is refining its marketing approach to improve customer engagement and support baseline sales growth. The company’s second-quarter results exposed gaps in campaign execution, as several promotional initiatives failed to generate the expected response. Too many marketing messages within a short period also made it harder for customers to recognize individual offers and placed additional pressure on restaurant operations.
In the second quarter of 2026, U.S. comparable sales grew 0.8%, below the company’s expectations. The FIFA campaign underperformed, while the previous year’s successful Minecraft promotion created a difficult comparison. MCD also faced challenges in communicating its new under-$3 Everyday Affordable Price menu. Lower-than-expected customer awareness and inconsistent restaurant-level execution limited the program’s contribution. These factors, combined with reduced digital offers and the removal of the Buy One, Add One for $1 promotion, accounted for approximately two-thirds of the customer traffic shortfall relative to expectations.
McDonald’s is adjusting its marketing priorities to address these issues. The company plans to increase personalized digital offers for frequent customers and allocate more marketing spending to established value offerings, including Extra Value Meals. The broader approach also places greater emphasis on creator engagement, influencer-led campaigns and the food quality and restaurant experience that support regular customer visits.
The key challenge lies in balancing promotional campaigns with baseline demand. McDonald’s recognizes that frequent product launches and short promotional windows may dilute customer awareness and complicate restaurant execution. A more focused marketing calendar, supported by relevant customer engagement and consistent execution, remains central to improving sales performance.
MCD vs. Restaurant Brands & Wendy’s: Can Marketing Drive More Sales?McDonald’s faces the challenge of improving campaign effectiveness and customer engagement after recent promotions fell short of expectations. Restaurant Brands International Inc. (QSR - Free Report) has linked Burger King’s marketing campaigns with product and service improvements, while The Wendy’s Company (WEN - Free Report) is shifting toward more consistent brand messaging to address weak customer traffic.
Burger King’s U.S. comparable sales increased 8.5% in the second quarter of 2026, outperforming the burger quick-service restaurant industry by more than 9 percentage points. Restaurant Brands built on its Whopper elevation campaign through initiatives such as Whopper Wednesday and Whopper by You. Average unit volumes across the Whopper platform increased more than 20% since the campaign’s launch. Service initiatives, including the Your Way Champion program and Whopper Guarantee, also support efforts to improve the customer experience.
Meanwhile, Wendy’s global systemwide sales declined 6.5% in the second quarter, while U.S. same-restaurant sales fell 7%. Traffic dropped 12.5%, and recent product launches and promotional collaborations failed to generate the expected customer response. The company plans to move away from frequent promotions toward a more consistent brand narrative.
For MCD, the comparison highlights the importance of connecting marketing campaigns with product quality, service execution and a clear brand message. These factors remain central to turning promotional activity into stronger customer engagement and sales.
MCD’s Price Performance, Valuation & EstimatesMcDonald’s shares have lost 22.3% in the past six months, underperforming the Zacks Retail - Restaurants industry, the broader Retail and Wholesale sector and the S&P 500 Index.
MCD Six-Month Price Performance
Image Source: Zacks Investment Research
In terms of its forward 12-month price-to-earnings ratio, MCD is trading at 17.44, below the industry’s 19.9.
MCD P/E (F12M)
Image Source: Zacks Investment Research
MCD’s earnings estimates for 2026 and 2027 have trended downward in the past 30 days. The revised estimates for 2026 and 2027 imply year-over-year growth of 5.3% and 6.6%, respectively.
MCD Estimate Trend
Image Source: Zacks Investment Research
Vertrix Wealth Management LLC grew its position in shares of Starbucks Corporation (NASDAQ:SBUX – Free Report) by 27.6% during the third quarter, according to its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The fund owned 32,404 shares of the coffee company’s stock after acquiring an additional 7,017 shares during the quarter. Vertrix Wealth Management LLC’s holdings in Starbucks were worth $3,045,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).
Several other institutional investors have also recently made changes to their positions in SBUX. BlackRock Inc. purchased a new position in Starbucks during the second quarter worth about $8,504,509,000. State Street Corp increased its stake in Starbucks by 3.2% in the 2nd quarter. State Street Corp now owns 49,260,268 shares of the coffee company’s stock valued at $5,033,907,000 after buying an additional 1,530,497 shares during the last quarter. T. Rowe Price Investment Management Inc. increased its stake in Starbucks by 65.9% in the 4th quarter. T. Rowe Price Investment Management Inc. now owns 19,447,854 shares of the coffee company’s stock valued at $1,637,704,000 after buying an additional 7,725,547 shares during the last quarter. Bank of America Corp DE bought a new position in shares of Starbucks during the 2nd quarter worth approximately $1,581,287,000. Finally, Invesco Ltd. grew its holdings in shares of Starbucks by 7.5% in the fourth quarter. Invesco Ltd. now owns 14,607,392 shares of the coffee company’s stock valued at $1,230,088,000 after acquiring an additional 1,016,898 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors own 72.29% of the company’s stock.
Trending Headlines about Starbucks Here are the key news stories impacting Starbucks this week:
Positive Sentiment: Starbucks ruled out a Chipotle acquisition. A company spokesperson said, “We are not buying Chipotle,” ending several days of takeover speculation. Investors viewed the decision as favorable because Starbucks can remain focused on improving its core coffee business rather than funding and integrating a large restaurant acquisition. Starbucks says it is not buying Chipotle after takeover speculation Positive Sentiment: Dividend growth supports the shareholder-return story. Coverage reported that Starbucks raised its dividend while continuing its turnaround. The increase may appeal to income-focused investors, although the company’s ability to sustain dividend growth will depend on improving earnings and cash flow. 3 Stocks Raise Dividends, But Which Has Room to Keep Growing? Insider Buying and Selling In other news, CEO Brady Brewer sold 2,229 shares of Starbucks stock in a transaction on Friday, September 4th. The shares were sold at an average price of $105.60, for a total transaction of $235,382.40. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer directly owned 73,149 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $7,724,534.40. The trade was a 2.96% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is accessible through this link. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Over the last three months, insiders have sold 6,099 shares of company stock valued at $627,135. 0.03% of the stock is owned by insiders. Starbucks Trading Up 1.7% SBUX stock opened at $92.29 on Tuesday. The firm has a 50 day moving average of $101.02 and a 200-day moving average of $100.96. Starbucks Corporation has a 12 month low of $77.99 and a 12 month high of $110.51. The firm has a market capitalization of $105.21 billion, a P/E ratio of 53.04, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.31 and a beta of 0.98.
Starbucks (NASDAQ:SBUX – Get Free Report) last released its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, July 29th. The coffee company reported $0.85 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.66 by $0.19. Starbucks had a net margin of 5.17% and a negative return on equity of 34.10%. The firm had revenue of $9.32 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $9.17 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the business earned $0.50 EPS. The business’s revenue for the quarter was down 1.4% on a year-over-year basis. Starbucks has set its FY 2026 guidance at 2.550-2.650 EPS. Sell-side analysts predict that Starbucks Corporation will post 2.59 EPS for the current year.
Starbucks Increases Dividend The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, November 27th. Shareholders of record on Friday, November 13th will be paid a $0.63 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, November 13th. This represents a $2.52 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 2.7%. This is a boost from Starbucks’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.62. Starbucks’s dividend payout ratio is presently 142.53%.
Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth SBUX has been the subject of a number of research analyst reports. UBS Group reaffirmed a “neutral” rating and set a $105.00 price target (down from $112.00) on shares of Starbucks in a research report on Thursday. Gordon Haskett lifted their price objective on shares of Starbucks from $110.00 to $118.00 and gave the stock a “hold” rating in a research report on Thursday, July 30th. Sanford C. Bernstein cut shares of Starbucks from an “outperform” rating to a “market perform” rating in a research note on Monday, August 3rd. William Blair reissued an “outperform” rating on shares of Starbucks in a research report on Thursday. Finally, Argus increased their target price on shares of Starbucks from $112.00 to $120.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Friday, July 31st. Twenty-three equities research analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating, twelve have issued a Hold rating and five have given a Sell rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, Starbucks currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $110.80.
Check Out Our Latest Analysis on SBUX
Starbucks Company Profile (Free Report)
Starbucks Corporation is a global specialty coffee company that operates coffeehouses and sells coffee, tea and other beverages, along with food products and merchandise. Its menu includes brewed coffee, espresso-based drinks, cold beverages, teas, bakery items and ready-to-eat food. Starbucks also markets packaged coffee, ready-to-drink beverages and related products through retail and grocery channels, often through licensing and other business partnerships.
Founded in Seattle in 1971, Starbucks expanded from a local coffee retailer into an international brand.
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Akcie společnosti PayPal za poslední měsíc vzrostly o 3,7 %; Zacks jim udělil rating č. 2 (Buy). Tržby v posledním čtvrtletí dosáhly 8,68 mld. USD, což představuje meziroční nárůst o 4,8 %.
Paypal (PYPL - Free Report) has recently been on Zacks.com's list of the most searched stocks. Therefore, you might want to consider some of the key factors that could influence the stock's performance in the near future.
Over the past month, shares of this technology platform and digital payments company have returned +3.7%, compared to the Zacks S&P 500 composite's +2.1% change. During this period, the Zacks Financial Transaction Services industry, which Paypal falls in, has gained 3%. The key question now is: What could be the stock's future direction?
Although media reports or rumors about a significant change in a company's business prospects usually cause its stock to trend and lead to an immediate price change, there are always certain fundamental factors that ultimately drive the buy-and-hold decision.
Revisions to Earnings EstimatesHere at Zacks, we prioritize appraising the change in the projection of a company's future earnings over anything else. That's because we believe the present value of its future stream of earnings is what determines the fair value for its stock.
Our analysis is essentially based on how sell-side analysts covering the stock are revising their earnings estimates to take the latest business trends into account. When earnings estimates for a company go up, the fair value for its stock goes up as well. And when a stock's fair value is higher than its current market price, investors tend to buy the stock, resulting in its price moving upward. Because of this, empirical studies indicate a strong correlation between trends in earnings estimate revisions and short-term stock price movements.
Paypal is expected to post earnings of $1.32 per share for the current quarter, representing a year-over-year change of -1.5%. Over the last 30 days, the Zacks Consensus Estimate has changed +0.1%.
The consensus earnings estimate of $5.38 for the current fiscal year indicates a year-over-year change of +1.3%. This estimate has remained unchanged over the last 30 days.
For the next fiscal year, the consensus earnings estimate of $5.8 indicates a change of +7.8% from what Paypal is expected to report a year ago. Over the past month, the estimate has remained unchanged.
Having a strong externally audited track record, our proprietary stock rating tool, the Zacks Rank, offers a more conclusive picture of a stock's price direction in the near term, since it effectively harnesses the power of earnings estimate revisions. Due to the size of the recent change in the consensus estimate, along with three other factors related to earnings estimates, Paypal is rated Zacks Rank #2 (Buy).
The chart below shows the evolution of the company's forward 12-month consensus EPS estimate:
12 Month EPS
Projected Revenue GrowthEven though a company's earnings growth is arguably the best indicator of its financial health, nothing much happens if it cannot raise its revenues. It's almost impossible for a company to grow its earnings without growing its revenue for long periods. Therefore, knowing a company's potential revenue growth is crucial.
For Paypal, the consensus sales estimate for the current quarter of $8.7 billion indicates a year-over-year change of +3.4%. For the current and next fiscal years, $34.66 billion and $36.1 billion estimates indicate +4.5% and +4.1% changes, respectively.
Last Reported Results and Surprise HistoryPaypal reported revenues of $8.68 billion in the last reported quarter, representing a year-over-year change of +4.8%. EPS of $1.38 for the same period compares with $1.4 a year ago.
Compared to the Zacks Consensus Estimate of $8.51 billion, the reported revenues represent a surprise of +2.02%. The EPS surprise was +7.81%.
Over the last four quarters, Paypal surpassed consensus EPS estimates three times. The company topped consensus revenue estimates three times over this period.
ValuationNo investment decision can be efficient without considering a stock's valuation. Whether a stock's current price rightly reflects the intrinsic value of the underlying business and the company's growth prospects is an essential determinant of its future price performance.
While comparing the current values of a company's valuation multiples, such as price-to-earnings (P/E), price-to-sales (P/S), and price-to-cash flow (P/CF), with its own historical values helps determine whether its stock is fairly valued, overvalued, or undervalued, comparing the company relative to its peers on these parameters gives a good sense of the reasonability of the stock's price.
As part of the Zacks Style Scores system, the Zacks Value Style Score (which evaluates both traditional and unconventional valuation metrics) organizes stocks into five groups ranging from A to F (A is better than B; B is better than C; and so on), making it helpful in identifying whether a stock is overvalued, rightly valued, or temporarily undervalued.
Paypal is graded A on this front, indicating that it is trading at a discount to its peers. Click here to see the values of some of the valuation metrics that have driven this grade.
ConclusionThe facts discussed here and much other information on Zacks.com might help determine whether or not it's worthwhile paying attention to the market buzz about Paypal. However, its Zacks Rank #2 does suggest that it may outperform the broader market in the near term.
Key Takeaways INTC is introducing Xeon-based rack designs with over 46,000 cores per rack to support agentic AI.Intel's Crescent Island GPU delivers up to 480GB of memory and 1.3 petaflops of FP8 computing performance.INTC is combining CPUs, GPUs and open software to make AI easier to deploy.
Intel Corporation (INTC - Free Report) is expanding its artificial intelligence (AI) infrastructure portfolio with new GPU technology, advanced Xeon processor systems and open software innovations to meet the growing demand for agentic AI. Its latest offerings aim to improve computing performance, power efficiency and scalability for enterprise AI workloads.
Intel introduced the latest Xeon-based rack designs to support the computing demands of agentic AI applications. Select Xeon 6+ configurations can deliver more than 46,000 cores per rack, enabling efficient data processing, workload management and task execution. Developed with ecosystem partners, these systems use open infrastructure standards to simplify deployment and help customers scale AI operations.
The company provided new details about its Intel GPU D-series, code-named Crescent Island. Built on Intel’s Xe3P architecture, the accelerator offers up to 480GB of LPDDR5X memory, 1.5TB/s of memory bandwidth and 1.3 petaflops of FP8 computing performance within a 350-watt power envelope. Designed for large language models and memory-intensive inference workloads, it supports models with up to 300 billion parameters on a single card and more than one trillion parameters in an eight-GPU system.
Intel is also advancing software integration across CPUs and GPUs to simplify AI application development and deployment. Its software ecosystem supports established AI frameworks, inference runtimes and emerging open models, while the AI for Enterprise Agent Toolkit provides orchestration capabilities for production AI applications.
Additionally, Intel is collaborating with industry partners to develop standardized accelerator designs that improve compatibility and simplify integration across systems. By combining Xeon processors, specialized GPUs and open software, the company is building a flexible and cost-effective foundation for deploying AI applications at scale.
How Are Competitors Performing in the AI Space?Intel faces competition from Qualcomm Incorporated (QCOM - Free Report) and Advanced Micro Devices (AMD - Free Report) . Qualcomm is strengthening its AI business with data center processors and AI accelerators. The company is collaborating with Amazon to develop custom chips for AI data centers. Qualcomm is developing energy-efficient technologies to enable faster AI processing while reducing power consumption.
AMD introduced its Helios rack-scale platform to support agentic AI workloads by combining EPYC processors and Instinct GPUs. The company is working with industry partners to provide flexible, scalable AI infrastructure for data centers. AMD is expanding its Instinct GPU portfolio to handle demanding AI training and inference workloads while improving computing performance and energy efficiency.
INTC’s Price Performance, Valuation & EstimatesShares of Intel have skyrocketed 184.4% over the past year compared with the industry’s growth of 32.2%.
Image Source: Zacks Investment Research
Going by the price/book ratio, the company's shares currently trade at 4.96 times book value, lower than the industry average of 23.36.
Image Source: Zacks Investment Research
INTC’s earnings estimates for 2026 have increased 2% to $1.50 per share, while those for 2027 have increased 2.1% to $1.97 over the past 60 days.
Image Source: Zacks Investment Research
Intel currently carries a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold). You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here.
For most of this year, the bear case on Shopify was elegantly simple.
If shoppers stop browsing websites and start asking an AI agent to buy things for them, what happens to the company whose entire business is building and powering websites?
Storefronts become wallpaper. Shopify becomes a commodity back end. The stock spent nine months pricing in some version of that fear.
It's worth sitting with how real the concern felt. Shares ended August down 8% on the year while the S&P 500 had gained nearly 12%. For a company compounding revenue north of 30%, that gap isn't a valuation reset. That is the market quietly questioning whether the business model survives the decade.
Then September happened.
Image Source: StockCharts
The Meta DealBack in September, Shopify CEO Tobi Lütke announced that Meta Platforms' new Muse personal AI agent would be able to complete purchases across Shopify's entire merchant network using Shop Pay. Mark Zuckerberg's framing was characteristically compact: “Shoppers find more. Shops sell more.” He added that more partnerships like it were coming soon. SHOP closed up more than 7% the following session.
Two days later, Shop Pay went live as a wallet inside Muse. The detail that matters is the scope. This is not a pilot with a handful of flagship brands. It is agentic checkout across all Shopify stores.
Within the same stretch, Amazon moved to block that very same agent from its marketplace. Two of the largest commerce platforms in the world looked at AI shopping agents and reached precisely opposite conclusions. One saw a threat to the customer relationship it has spent thirty years building. The other saw distribution.
Why Shopify Gets Paid Either WayCFO Jeff Hoffmeister made the structural case at Goldman Sachs' Communacopia conference in September, and I'd argue it's the most important thing management has said all year. Shopify's economics do not depend on which AI assistant a shopper happens to open. Whether the journey begins in ChatGPT, in Copilot, or in Muse, if it ends at a Shopify checkout, Shopify gets paid.
That single observation reframes the entire debate. Shopify isn't competing with the agents for the customer. It is becoming the settlement layer underneath them — the rails rather than the destination. Rails are a less glamorous business than storefronts. They are also a far more durable one.
The behavioral data backs it up. Shoppers arriving from a large language model are 2.5 times more likely to land directly on a product page, which the company ties to roughly an 80% uplift in conversion. About 75% of AI-attributed orders in the second quarter came from outside Shopify's top 100 product categories.
Agents are not cannibalizing demand that merchants already had. They are surfacing the long tail that conventional search never served particularly well.
Earlier this month, Shopify extended the same logic in the other direction with Canvas, a tool that lets a merchant build a storefront by talking to Sidekick, the company's AI assistant, in roughly twenty minutes. Muse brings buyers in the front door. Canvas lowers the cost of becoming a merchant in the first place. Both ends of the funnel get cheaper at once.
The Numbers Behind the NarrativeNarratives are worth only what the financials support, so here is the arithmetic. Second-quarter revenue of $3.58 billion grew 34% year over year and beat the Zacks Consensus Estimate by 4.36%. Earnings of $0.42 per share topped the $0.39 consensus by 7.69% and grew 20% from the $0.35 posted a year earlier. Gross merchandise volume reached $115.57 billion, up 32%. Free cash flow of $654 million came in 21% ahead of expectations at a margin above 18%.
Shopify has now beaten revenue estimates in each of the past 16 quarters. The earnings line has been less consistent, with two beats in four. It stems from management's willingness to spend against the opportunity in front of them, not from any softness in demand.
Looking ahead, the Zacks Consensus Estimate for the current year stands at $1.89 per share on $15.19 billion in revenue. The third quarter, due in early November, carries a $0.45 consensus on $3.74 billion. Management has guided revenue growth to the low thirties, which sits comfortably above where the Street has modeled the quarter — a setup in which the bar may be lower than the business.
Image Source: Zacks Investment Research
Shopify (SHOP - Free Report) carried a Zacks Rank #2 (Buy) as of its most recent update, reflecting the favorable estimate revisions that preceded the August report.
Bottom LineWhat changed this fall was not Shopify's growth rate, which has been excellent throughout. What changed was the answer to the question hanging over the stock.
For nine months the market assumed AI agents would route around Shopify and strand it as infrastructure nobody sees. Meta's decision, and Zuckerberg's promise of more deals to come, points the other way entirely: the agents need somewhere to send the money, and Shopify already owns the checkout.
That is a materially different investment case than the one being priced in July, and the shares have only just begun to reflect it. The upcoming earnings report will tell us whether the fundamentals are moving as quickly as the narrative.
NorthCrest Asset Manangement LLC increased its stake in American Express Company (NYSE:AXP – Free Report) by 171.5% during the third quarter, according to the company in its most recent disclosure with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The firm owned 41,413 shares of the payment services company’s stock after acquiring an additional 26,158 shares during the quarter. NorthCrest Asset Manangement LLC’s holdings in American Express were worth $12,594,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.
Other institutional investors have also added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Avior Wealth Management LLC raised its holdings in American Express by 0.8% during the 3rd quarter. Avior Wealth Management LLC now owns 16,599 shares of the payment services company’s stock worth $5,048,000 after purchasing an additional 131 shares during the last quarter. Baldwin Wealth Partners LLC MA raised its stake in American Express by 1,178.3% during the third quarter. Baldwin Wealth Partners LLC MA now owns 8,488 shares of the payment services company’s stock worth $2,581,000 after buying an additional 7,824 shares during the last quarter. Woodstock Corp lifted its holdings in American Express by 24.5% in the third quarter. Woodstock Corp now owns 5,425 shares of the payment services company’s stock valued at $1,650,000 after buying an additional 1,069 shares during the period. Marquette Asset Management LLC lifted its holdings in American Express by 35.4% in the third quarter. Marquette Asset Management LLC now owns 172 shares of the payment services company’s stock valued at $52,000 after buying an additional 45 shares during the period. Finally, Tilia Fiduciary Partners Inc. lifted its holdings in American Express by 4.4% in the third quarter. Tilia Fiduciary Partners Inc. now owns 8,282 shares of the payment services company’s stock valued at $2,519,000 after buying an additional 350 shares during the period. 84.33% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.
American Express News Summary Here are the key news stories impacting American Express this week:
Positive Sentiment: JPMorgan maintained an “overweight” rating while lowering its price target from $400 to $360, implying approximately 15.5% potential upside from the recent trading level. JPMorgan price target report Positive Sentiment: American Express is reportedly expanding its Gen Z customer base about 40%, substantially faster than its Boomer customer base. Stronger younger-customer adoption could support long-term spending volumes and card growth. American Express Gen Z growth article Positive Sentiment: American Express was named title sponsor of the inaugural Hong Kong Sail Grand Prix, expanding its global marketing and premium-card brand exposure. The event is more strategically supportive than financially material in the near term. Hong Kong Sail Grand Prix sponsorship announcement Neutral Sentiment: American Express is scheduled to participate in upcoming investor conferences, potentially giving management an opportunity to discuss growth plans, regulatory remediation and its financial outlook. Investor conference announcement Negative Sentiment: American Express National Bank was fined $350 million by the OCC and received a cease-and-desist order over weaknesses in its anti-money-laundering controls and suspicious-activity reporting. Although the company says the action does not change near-term guidance, remediation expenses, oversight requirements and reputational risks could pressure margins and management focus. OCC AML enforcement article Negative Sentiment: A law firm is investigating potential shareholder claims related to the company, adding a governance and litigation overhang, although such investigations do not necessarily lead to financial recovery or formal litigation. Shareholder investigation announcement Analysts Set New Price Targets A number of brokerages have commented on AXP. Truist Financial cut their price target on shares of American Express from $375.00 to $370.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research report on Wednesday, September 23rd. BTIG Research dropped their price objective on American Express from $315.00 to $230.00 and set a “sell” rating on the stock in a research note on Monday, September 7th. BMO Capital Markets began coverage on American Express in a research report on Thursday. They set an “outperform” rating and a $380.00 target price on the stock. Evercore set a $320.00 target price on American Express in a research report on Thursday, October 1st. Finally, Bank of America raised their target price on American Express from $387.00 to $391.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Thursday, July 9th. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, fifteen have given a Buy rating, fourteen have given a Hold rating and one has issued a Sell rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat, the stock has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $365.63. Get Our Latest Report on American Express
Shares of NYSE AXP opened at $311.57 on Tuesday. The company has a quick ratio of 1.54, a current ratio of 1.55 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.66. The firm has a market cap of $210.41 billion, a PE ratio of 18.91, a P/E/G ratio of 1.33 and a beta of 1.08. The company’s fifty day simple moving average is $323.84 and its 200 day simple moving average is $325.10. American Express Company has a 12-month low of $290.97 and a 12-month high of $387.49.
American Express (NYSE:AXP – Get Free Report) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Friday, July 24th. The payment services company reported $4.53 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $4.41 by $0.12. American Express had a net margin of 15.07% and a return on equity of 34.12%. The firm had revenue of $14.99 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $19.70 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the firm posted $4.08 earnings per share. The business’s revenue was up 10.0% compared to the same quarter last year. American Express has set its FY 2026 guidance at 17.300-17.900 EPS. As a group, sell-side analysts forecast that American Express Company will post 17.67 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.
American Express Announces Dividend The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Tuesday, November 10th. Stockholders of record on Friday, October 9th will be paid a $0.95 dividend. The ex-dividend date is Friday, October 9th. This represents a $3.80 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 1.2%. American Express’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is currently 23.06%.
American Express Company Profile (Free Report)
American Express Company (NYSE: AXP) is a global financial services company that provides payment, lending, travel and related products to consumers, small businesses and corporate customers. Its offerings include consumer and business charge and credit cards, payment solutions, commercial financing, deposit products and rewards programs.
American Express also operates a worldwide merchant network and provides businesses with payment acceptance services, transaction-processing capabilities and data-driven marketing solutions.
Featured Articles Five stocks we like better than American Express Salesforce Just Got a Rare Double Upgrade—What Changed? OpenAI’s Revenue Scare Could Be a Big Opportunity for Investors China Still Dominates Rare Earths—These 3 U.S. Companies Could Benefit 3 REITs That May Win in a Higher Interest Rate Environment
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Očekává se, že Travelers ve třetím čtvrtletí roku 2026 vykáže zisk 6,90 USD na akcii, což by meziročně představovalo pokles o 15,2 %, při tržbách ve výši 12,4 miliardy USD.
Key Takeaways Travelers' Q3 EPS is projected to fall 15.2% to $6.90, with revenues declining 0.4% to $12.4B.TRV's positive Earnings ESP signals a potential beat on higher investment income and better pricing.Strong retention & underwriting discipline may aid Travelers, but catastrophe claims could dampen profits.
The Travelers Companies, Inc. (TRV - Free Report) is expected to register a decline in its top and bottom line when it reports third-quarter 2026 results on Oct. 16, before the opening bell.
The Zacks Consensus Estimate for TRV’s third-quarter revenues is pegged at $12.4 billion, indicating a 0.4% decline from the year-ago reported figure.
The consensus estimate for earnings is pegged at $6.90 per share. The Zacks Consensus Estimate for TRV’s third-quarter earnings has moved up 1.5% in the past seven days. The estimate suggests a year-over-year decrease of 15.2%.
What the Zacks Model Unveils for TRVOur proven model predicts an earnings beat for Travelers this time around. This is because the stock has the right combination of a positive Earnings ESP and a Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy), 2 (Buy) or 3 (Hold), which increases the chances of an earnings beat.
TRV’s Earnings ESP: Travelers has an Earnings ESP of +0.77%. This is because the Most Accurate Estimate of $6.95 is pegged higher than the Zacks Consensus Estimate of $6.90. You can uncover the best stocks to buy or sell before they’re reported with our Earnings ESP Filter.
TRV’s Zacks Rank: The stock carries a Zacks Rank #3 at present.You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank stocks here.
Factors to ConsiderPremiums are likely to have benefited from better pricing, a solid renewal rate change, strong retention and exposure growth. The Zacks Consensus Estimate is currently pegged at $11 billion, indicating a decrease of 1.2% from the year-ago reported number.
A higher average level of fixed maturity investments and higher long-term average yields are likely to aid investment results in the to-be-reported quarter. Management estimates fixed income NII, including earnings from short-term securities, of approximately $840 million after tax in the third quarter. The Zacks Consensus Estimate for net investment income is currently pegged at $1.1 billion, implying an increase of 3.8% from the year-ago reported number.
The Personal Insurance segment is likely to have benefited from rate actions, disciplined underwriting and better automobile loss experience. The Zacks Consensus Estimate is currently pegged at $4.4 billion, indicating a decrease of 5.9% from the year-ago reported number.
The Bond & Specialty Insurance segment is likely to have benefited from sustained demand for surety products, particularly coverage associated with large construction and infrastructure projects. Management liability insurance might also have supported premium production through stable renewal pricing and strong retention. The Zacks Consensus Estimate is currently pegged at $1.2 billion, indicating an increase of 7% from the year-ago reported number.
Strong policy retention, new business production and renewal premium increases, particularly in Middle Market and small commercial insurance, are likely to have aided premiums at Business Insurance. The Zacks Consensus Estimate is currently pegged at $5.7 billion, indicating an increase of 1.4% from the year-ago reported number.
An increase in net written premiums, coupled with higher net investment income and other revenues, is likely to have aided the top line in the to-be-reported quarter.
Better pricing and increased exposure, coupled with prudent underwriting, are expected to have aided underwriting profitability. Yet, severe thunderstorms, windstorms, hail and hurricane-related claims may have increased claims costs, particularly in Personal Insurance and commercial property lines. The Zacks Consensus Estimate for combined ratio is currently pegged at 92.08, indicating a deterioration of 478 basis points from the year-ago reported number.
Although commercial insurance premium growth is likely to have remained positive, slowing renewal pricing could have limited its pace. Also, Personal Insurance net written premiums could have remained under pressure amid selective underwriting actions and the absence of contributions from Canadian operations sold in the first quarter of 2026.
Expenses are expected to have risen due to higher claims and claim adjustment expenses, amortization of deferred acquisition costs, general and administrative expenses, and interest expenses.
Continued share buybacks are anticipated to have provided an additional boost to the bottom line.
Other Stocks to ConsiderHere are three other P&C insurance stocks you may want to consider, as our model shows that these also have the right combination of elements to post an earnings beat:
Cincinnati Financial Corporation (CINF - Free Report) has an Earnings ESP of +9.52% and a Zacks Rank of 2 at present. The Zacks Consensus Estimate for third-quarter 2026 earnings is pegged at $1.91 per share, indicating a year-over-year decrease of 33%.
CINF’s earnings beat estimates in three of the last four reported quarters, while missing in one.
Arch Capital Group (ACGL - Free Report) has an Earnings ESP of +9.62% and a Zacks Rank of 3 at present. The Zacks Consensus Estimate for third-quarter 2026 earnings is pegged at $1.96 per share, indicating a 29.2% year-over-year decrease.
ACGL’s earnings beat estimates in the last four reported quarters.
W.R. Berkley Corporation (WRB - Free Report) has an Earnings ESP of +1.31% and a Zacks Rank #3 at present. The Zacks Consensus Estimate for third-quarter 2026 earnings is pegged at $1.14, indicating a year-over-year increase of 3.6%.
WRB’s earnings beat estimates in three of the last four reported quarters, while missing in one.
SummaryMGM Resorts (MGM) trades at a deep discount after a failed $48.30/share takeover, with shares now near $29 despite stable fundamentals.
MGM's lease-heavy structure, robust buybacks, and diversified assets underpin a fair value estimate of $45/share, with downside risk to $27.
Operating trends have softened, but MGM remains the cheapest among peers on lease-adjusted EBITDAR and free cash flow yield metrics.
Key risks include fixed rent in a weak Strip market, Macau softness, BetMGM underperformance, and capital commitments to Osaka.
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Four Months Of A Takeover If you are feeling a bit out of sync with this stock market, you are not alone. A narrow group of large AI-related companies is trouncing the rest of the market, while
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BetMGM ve 3. čtvrtletí zvýšila čisté tržby o 7 % na 710 milionů USD a upravený zisk EBITDA dosáhl 86 milionů USD; celoroční výhled tržeb i upraveného EBITDA potvrdila na spodní hranici stanovených pásem.
BetMGM said its third-quarter performance kept the sports betting and iGaming operator on track to meet its full-year 2026 financial targets, citing a strong summer, solid early-season football engagement and continued emphasis on higher-value customers.
The company, which is backed by Entain LON: ENT and MGM Resorts, reported third-quarter net revenue of $710 million, up 7% from a year earlier, and adjusted EBITDA of $86 million. Management said it continues to expect full-year revenue of $2.9 billion to $3.1 billion and adjusted EBITDA of $300 million to $350 million, with both results expected toward the lower end of those ranges.
BetMGM said it is targeting sustainable profitability through selective customer acquisition, retention efforts and investments in markets and products that offer higher returns. The company reiterated that it sees a path to $500 million in adjusted EBITDA sometime after 2027.
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iGaming Growth Supported by Content and Alberta Launch
iGaming generated $483 million in third-quarter net revenue, an increase of 6% year over year. Net gaming revenue per active player rose 4%, while active players increased 2%.
Management said iGaming accounts for about 70% of BetMGM’s business and remains a key area of focus. The company pointed to its exclusive content strategy, including the U.S. launch of its Game of Thrones franchise, which it called its most successful game launch across its markets. BetMGM also introduced its SideBet Jackpot feature in Michigan and West Virginia and plans to roll it out across all gaming markets by year-end.
In Alberta, BetMGM said customer returns and per-player metrics have been attractive, with several indicators exceeding the performance seen after the Ontario launch. CFO Gary Deutsch said Alberta had a negligible effect on sports revenue in its first quarter of operation but contributed about two percentage points to iGaming growth. About 20% of players acquired during the quarter came from Alberta, he said.
The company also said its Borgata brand relaunch has gained traction. Average daily active users in New Jersey and Pennsylvania, where the refreshed app is available, were up 28% from a February pre-launch benchmark.
Sports Revenue Rises Despite Fewer Active Players
Online sports betting revenue rose 7% year over year to $216 million, while retail sports revenue increased 5% to $11 million. Online sports handle rose 3%, although year-over-year comparisons were affected by the inclusion of the World Cup in July and one fewer weekend of NFL and college football activity in September.
BetMGM said its strategy of prioritizing player value over total player count continued to lift customer metrics. Handle per active player increased 13%, while net gaming revenue per active player rose 18%. Average monthly active users declined 9%, a result management said reflected its deliberate reduction in investment in lower-return online-sports-only markets.
The company cited improvements to sportsbook speed, stability, cash-out functions, bet tracking, customizable bets and rewards features. It said September produced strong reactivations among higher-value customers. In Nevada, where BetMGM operates an omnichannel offering, online sports betting handle increased 8% during the quarter.
Management said competition remains intense, particularly from unregulated and illegal sports betting operators, and expects those conditions to persist at least through mid-2027. BetMGM also discussed prediction-market competitors, saying their marketing activity remains elevated but that its own customer acquisition costs and expected payback periods have improved since the latter stages of the World Cup.
Cash Returns to Parent Companies
BetMGM began paying fees to its parent companies earlier in 2026 for licenses and services. The company recorded $18 million in parent fees during the third quarter and made an additional $50 million cash distribution, resulting in total cash returned to Entain and MGM Resorts of $68 million.
Deutsch said the company’s strong EBITDA flow-through this year has primarily reflected lower marketing costs compared with the prior year. He added that payment-processing efficiencies and other operating improvements also contributed, while data, content and tax costs remain areas where expenses can be difficult to reduce.
BetMGM said it will continue to allocate capital toward profitable customer acquisition and retention, particularly in multi-product markets, iGaming, Nevada and premium online sports customers, as it enters the heart of the NFL season.
About Entain (LON:ENT)Entain plc LSE: ENT is a FTSE100 company and is one of the world's largest sports betting and gaming groups, operating both online and in the retail sector. The Group owns a comprehensive portfolio of established brands; Sports brands include BetCity, bwin, Coral, Crystalbet, Eurobet, Ladbrokes, Neds, Sportingbet, Sports Interaction, STS, SuperSport and TAB NZ; Gaming brands include Foxy Bingo, Gala, GiocoDigitale, Ninja Casino, Optibet, Partypoker and PartyCasino. The Group owns proprietary technology across all its core product verticals and in addition to its B2C operations provides services to a number of third-party customers on a B2B basis.
The Group has a 50/50 joint venture, BetMGM, a leader in sports betting and iGaming in the US.
This instant news alert was generated by narrative science technology and financial data from MarketBeat in order to provide readers with the fastest reporting and unbiased coverage. Please send any questions or comments about this story to [email protected].
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Scott Capital Advisors LLC acquired a new stake in Chevron Corporation (NYSE:CVX – Free Report) during the 3rd quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The firm acquired 3,099 shares of the oil and gas company’s stock, valued at approximately $636,000.
A number of other institutional investors have also made changes to their positions in the company. Blue Capital Inc. bought a new stake in Chevron during the second quarter valued at $786,000. OneAscent Wealth Management LLC bought a new position in shares of Chevron during the second quarter worth about $973,000. Global Retirement Partners LLC acquired a new position in Chevron during the 2nd quarter valued at about $14,276,000. Ferguson Wellman Capital Management Inc. increased its stake in shares of Chevron by 0.6% in the third quarter. Ferguson Wellman Capital Management Inc. now owns 911,718 shares of the oil and gas company’s stock valued at $186,182,000 after purchasing an additional 5,787 shares during the period. Finally, Janney Montgomery Scott LLC grew its holdings in Chevron by 6.8% in the 1st quarter. Janney Montgomery Scott LLC now owns 1,251,102 shares of the oil and gas company’s stock worth $258,853,000 after buying an additional 79,439 shares in the last quarter. 72.42% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.
Chevron News Roundup Here are the key news stories impacting Chevron this week:
Positive Sentiment: Chevron was added to Zacks’ Rank #1 (Strong Buy) income-stocks list, reinforcing the appeal of its dividend and operating outlook. Best Income Stocks to Buy for October 13th Positive Sentiment: TD Cowen raised its Chevron price target from $215 to $225 while maintaining a Hold rating. The higher target reflects potential upside supported by production growth, cost savings and cash flow. Chevron Stock Gets Price Target Increase from TD Cowen Positive Sentiment: Chevron and Egypt are advancing discussions surrounding Cyprus’ Aphrodite gas field and pipeline, including commercial agreements, long-lead procurement and a potential final investment decision. Progress could create a longer-term international gas-growth catalyst. Chevron and Egypt Discuss Next Steps for Aphrodite Gas Pipeline Positive Sentiment: Analysts continue to cite Chevron’s strong cash flow, expanding production, cost reductions, Hess integration and upbeat 2026 earnings expectations. The stock has outperformed the broader energy industry over recent months. CVX Outpaces Industry in Past 6 Months Neutral Sentiment: Chevron’s planned January 2027 leadership changes will make Jeff Gustavson CFO and move current CFO Eimear Bonner to lead Oil, Products & Gas. The restructuring ties New Energies more closely to the core business, but execution risks remain. Chevron CFO Shake-Up Negative Sentiment: Hurricane-related shutdowns temporarily disrupted U.S. Gulf oil production, although Chevron and other major producers are restoring output. The interruption could weigh on near-term volumes and earnings. U.S. Gulf Oil Production Restored After Hurricane Negative Sentiment: Chevron’s CEO warned that restrictions on diesel and fuel exports could backfire, potentially tightening regional supply and creating unfavorable market distortions. Separately, the average reported price target of $213.08 is slightly below the stock’s opening price, suggesting limited consensus upside. Chevron CEO Warns Against Diesel and Fuel Export Decision Insider Buying and Selling In other Chevron news, Director John Hess sold 710,665 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, August 3rd. The stock was sold at an average price of $194.10, for a total transaction of $137,940,076.50. Following the transaction, the director owned 363,711 shares in the company, valued at $70,596,305.10. This trade represents a 66.15% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available at the SEC website. Also, CEO Michael Wirth sold 317,100 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Friday, August 14th. The stock was sold at an average price of $200.46, for a total transaction of $63,565,866.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer owned 26,308 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $5,273,701.68. The trade was a 92.34% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The SEC filing for this sale provides additional information. In the last three months, insiders have sold 1,152,582 shares of company stock worth $225,853,661. 0.56% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders. Analyst Ratings Changes A number of research firms recently commented on CVX. Dbs Bank upgraded shares of Chevron to a “moderate buy” rating in a research note on Thursday, August 6th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. lifted their target price on Chevron from $190.00 to $222.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a report on Monday, August 3rd. Wells Fargo & Company raised their target price on shares of Chevron from $226.00 to $230.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a report on Thursday, September 3rd. Mizuho set a $234.00 target price on Chevron in a report on Monday. Finally, Zacks Research upgraded Chevron from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a report on Monday, October 5th. One analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, twenty-one have issued a Buy rating, five have assigned a Hold rating and one has given a Sell rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $213.08.
Read Our Latest Stock Report on Chevron
Chevron Price Performance NYSE CVX opened at $214.89 on Tuesday. The company has a quick ratio of 0.98, a current ratio of 1.25 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.19. The stock has a market capitalization of $424.57 billion, a PE ratio of 20.60, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 0.59 and a beta of 0.53. The company has a 50 day moving average price of $204.94 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $193.04. Chevron Corporation has a 12-month low of $146.49 and a 12-month high of $217.78.
Chevron (NYSE:CVX – Get Free Report) last released its quarterly earnings results on Friday, July 31st. The oil and gas company reported $6.06 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $5.55 by $0.51. The business had revenue of $67.20 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $62.72 billion. Chevron had a net margin of 9.57% and a return on equity of 11.09%. Chevron’s revenue for the quarter was up 57.4% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter last year, the firm earned $1.77 EPS. As a group, equities analysts predict that Chevron Corporation will post 17.34 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.
Chevron Announces Dividend The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Thursday, September 10th. Investors of record on Wednesday, August 19th were paid a $1.78 dividend. This represents a $7.12 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 3.3%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Wednesday, August 19th. Chevron’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 68.26%.
About Chevron (Free Report)
Chevron Corporation (NYSE:CVX) is an integrated energy company engaged in the exploration, development, production, transportation and sale of crude oil and natural gas. Its upstream operations include oil and gas exploration and production, while its downstream business includes refining crude oil, marketing fuels and manufacturing and distributing lubricants, petrochemicals and fuel additives.
The company also invests in lower-carbon businesses and technologies, including renewable fuels, carbon capture and storage, hydrogen and other opportunities intended to reduce emissions from its operations and energy products.
Further Reading Five stocks we like better than Chevron Salesforce Just Got a Rare Double Upgrade—What Changed? OpenAI’s Revenue Scare Could Be a Big Opportunity for Investors China Still Dominates Rare Earths—These 3 U.S. Companies Could Benefit 3 REITs That May Win in a Higher Interest Rate Environment
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Analytik očekává, že akcie Phillips 66 (PSX) vzrostou o 25 % na 346 USD díky přetrvávajícímu nedostatku rafinovaných produktů a vyšším rafinérským maržím.
SummaryPhillips 66 stands to benefit from global refined product scarcity, driven by Russian supply disruptions and Gulf instability.I rate PSX a Buy, targeting 25% upside to $346 using a 12x PE multiple, higher than consensus due to its diversified business mix.Consensus underappreciates the duration and magnitude of elevated crack spreads; I expect normalization to take longer, supporting higher forward earnings.Key risks include rapid normalization of energy flows or resolution of the Ukraine conflict, but current geopolitics suggest continued supply tightness. Olga Kostrova /iStock via Getty Images
Introduction The Iran war and subsequent shock to energy prices led me to research and invest in refining, LNG, and oil stocks. At first, as a short-term hedge, they have now become a core part of the portfolio. As
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Audit společnosti BailSec uvádí, že 1inch Aqua brání dvojímu využití likvidity ve smart kontraktech, ačkoli off-chain systémy mohou sdílený kapitál započítat dvakrát.
An audit can reduce risk, but it can never guarantee that a DeFi protocol is safe. 1inch spoke to Vik from BailSec about what smart contract audits actually tell us, the risks that exist beyond the code and what stood out when BailSec audited 1inch Aqua.
Smart contract audits have become a standard part of DeFi security. But hacks still happen to audited protocols. And increasingly, the weak point may not be the smart contract at all.
So what does an audit really prove? And how should you assess the security of a new architecture such as 1inch Aqua?
1inch spoke to Vik from BailSec, one of the security firms that audited Aqua, about the limits of audits and the security implications of Aqua’s approach to liquidity.
When you assess the security of a DeFi protocol today, what are the biggest risks you look for beyond obvious smart contract bugs?Many risks come from beyond the code. We look at the ecosystem itself, composability, design patterns, economic attacks and governance.
Ecosystem-level risks involve things like flash loans, liquidity manipulation, unusual token variations and potential breaks caused by future EVM hard forks.
Composability is a core value proposition of DeFi. But it also means a system may be used in ways its authors did not intend when they wrote it. Assessing that risk requires long experience with protocol security and a broad understanding of how people actually use smart contracts.
Design patterns matter as well. Established standards such as ERCs and well-understood techniques can lead to more robust interactions. A well-designed protocol uses established patterns to solve standard problems so developers can focus on the parts that are genuinely new.
Then there are economic attacks. These include second-order vulnerabilities that go beyond smart contract security and require familiarity with how DeFi products actually get used.
Finally, there is governance risk. The question is: what happens if a trusted part of the system is not so trusted? A well-designed system takes a defense-in-depth approach and limits even privileged roles to the minimum permissions they need.
How should teams think about the limits of an audit? What can a strong audit establish and what can it never guarantee?Auditors are skilled experts, but they are limited by the scope of the engagement. We are limited both by time and by which portions of the system are under review.
An audit is also time-bound. If the client introduces additional complexity in the middle of the engagement, it may no longer be possible to achieve the coverage that the original time estimate was intended to provide.
And auditors can make mistakes. At BailSec, we rigorously test the auditors we work with and hire some of the best auditors in the space to dramatically reduce the risk that an auditing team misses a substantial bug. But that risk is never zero.
If an audit report contains many medium- and high-severity findings, that density can suggest there may be more bugs remaining after the review. In that case, we recommend engaging another audit team for a second round.
The development team might also change the code after the audit. We cannot ensure that those changes do not introduce new bugs or violate invariants that were verified during our audit.
Even without any of those issues, an audit can never guarantee that a codebase is bug-free or cannot be hacked. It provides a high degree of assurance that the system behaves as designed. It is not proof.
Even formal verification cannot ensure that a codebase is entirely free of unexpected behavior. Formal verification establishes that reviewed code matches a formal specification, but the specification itself may be incomplete. It could miss an attack vector. And the code eventually deployed may not be the code that was reviewed.
Smart contract audits used to be mostly about the contracts themselves. How much does security now depend on protecting the whole stack?Infrastructure and key compromise have become a major root cause of losses across the ecosystem by dollar value.
Unless otherwise specified, a smart contract audit typically does not include those components. Some may also contain intellectual property or trade secrets that a project does not want to disclose to a third-party smart contract auditing firm.
That makes it difficult for us to ensure that the combination of APIs, the frontend, infrastructure and other off-chain components maintains the invariants intended by the team.
Good smart contract design can go a long way toward mitigating these risks. Where possible, logic can be moved from off-chain components on-chain, while the mutability of on-chain components can be minimized.
Immutability is a desirable quality in a robustly designed smart contract system because it reduces exceptions and assumptions and can provide a higher degree of assurance.
What do SOC 2 and ISO 27001 cover that a smart contract audit cannot?These security controls and certifications help cover a missing component: the combination of smart contracts, off-chain components and the larger organization operating them.
The frameworks address the organization that builds and operates the system, including access controls, key management, change management, vendor risk and incident response.
Supply-chain attacks have also become a greater risk in recent years. These standards provide evidence that an organization has taken steps to reduce that risk. Controls over endpoints and personnel can also help reduce the risk of insider attacks.
There is an important distinction within SOC 2 between a Type I attestation, which looks at controls at a point in time, and Type II, which covers how controls operate over a period of time.
But SOC 2 and ISO 27001 are not magic bullets. Just as a smart contract audit cannot completely prevent a hack, these frameworks cannot eliminate risk. They reduce the risk caused by weaknesses in other components of the system.
BailSec audited 1inch Aqua earlier this year. What was unusual or particularly interesting about Aqua from a security perspective?First of all, Aqua was something very fresh and new to the DeFi world, which was refreshing for us to review. It was not another fork of something else.
Aqua has a special design in two respects. It allows a high degree of customizability and flexibility in the strategies through which market makers deploy their capital. And it increases capital efficiency by allowing makers to deploy the same capital into multiple strategies.
That customizability puts more responsibility on the software components used to design strategies. They need to follow robust compositional rules and avoid invalid strategy configurations that could result in a loss of funds.
Deploying the same capital across multiple strategies also means that, while capital efficiency increases, the exposure of a maker’s capital to an economic vulnerability in a strategy can increase as well.
Another unusual feature is the requirement for takers to explicitly specify the maker strategies they interact with. That is an inversion of the typical AMM design, where multiple makers put capital into a single pool and interaction with it does not depend on the number of underlying makers.
Aqua lets liquidity remain in the maker’s wallet until a taker fills a position. Does that create additional risks?Aqua’s design eliminates certain classes of attacks that can drain capital held in liquidity pools. Eliminating that line of attack improves the security posture of the design.
It also gives makers an effective mechanism for cutting off their exposure to undesirable strategies by docking or revoking allowances.
Some risk is not fully eliminated but instead moves from balances held in pools to ERC-20 allowances. Still, the overall posture is an improvement.
What about double-spending? If the same balance backs multiple strategies, can the same liquidity be used twice?The smart contracts themselves ensure that liquidity cannot be used twice.
But shared capital does mean that one strategy may run out of available liquidity because a neighboring strategy has consumed it.
It is also important to keep this shared-capital model in mind when calculating aggregate market depth, TVL or available liquidity. Otherwise, off-chain components that do not understand how the system works could count the same liquidity twice.
So the liquidity cannot be spent twice by the smart contracts, but it can potentially be counted twice by off-chain systems.
Aqua gives takers more flexibility. Can that flexibility also increase risk?Yes. The order in which liquidity is consumed by the taker can affect the price at which future swaps take place.
Off-chain components that assess liquidity therefore need enough domain knowledge to sequence interactions appropriately.
For makers, a single economically risky strategy could potentially produce losses affecting the capital deployed across strategies. For takers, the main risk is that a particular maker may run out of capital during a swap because of collateral sharing. Systems deciding how to use the available liquidity need to account for that.
All swaps should also be protected by appropriate slippage limits to reduce exposure to risks such as MEV and front-running.
Aqua has been audited. Does that mean it is safe?An audit cannot ensure total safety. The fact that Aqua has undergone multiple audits is a strong indication that its authors take security seriously. It also provides evidence that the security of the system has been improved from its initial implementation.
But protocol security is a continuum. It is not a single state. Completing audits with multiple expert teams moves a protocol further along that continuum, but issues can still slip through an auditor’s review. That is why it is important to engage multiple teams and put as many expert eyes as possible on the contracts.
Users should also consider the risks of interacting with DeFi products and avoid exposing themselves to losses they cannot tolerate.
For sufficiently technical users and partners, the published audit reports themselves provide details about the potential pitfalls of the system and exactly what the auditing teams considered as part of their reviews.
At BailSec, we always recommend reading the reports. For non-technical users, AI tools can now also make it much easier to summarize audit findings and understand what a report actually says about a protocol’s security.
Security is never a finished job. Audits, careful protocol design and ongoing review can reduce risk, but none can turn DeFi into a risk-free environment.
For more on blockchain security, subscribe to our newsletter
Společnost Hormel Foods ve 3. čtvrtletí 2026 zvýšila upravenou provozní marži o 60 bazických bodů na 9 %, přestože objemy prodeje v maloobchodě klesaly.
Key Takeaways HRL began benefiting from lower pork commodity prices in the third quarter, with more gains expected ahead.HRL faced elevated beef, freight, logistics and fuel costs, plus higher short-term turkey supply-chain costs.HRL is using pricing, mix, efficiency gains and SG&A actions to improve profitability amid cost pressures. Hormel Foods Corp. (HRL - Free Report) continues to improve profitability despite softer Retail volumes pressuring sales. In the third quarter of 2026, the company expanded its adjusted operating margin by 60 basis points to 9%, contributing to a 30-basis-point improvement in the first nine months. Adjusted earnings per share increased 6% year over year to 37 cents.
The margin improvement came despite Retail volume declines, driven by business exits, lower whole-bird and private-label snack nut volumes, contract manufacturing and pricing-related elasticity. Consumer takeaway across branded Retail weakened, while total company dollar consumption declined 1% during the quarter compared with approximately 1% growth earlier in the year.
However, Hormel Foods continued to benefit from operational measures supporting profitability across its business. The Foodservice segment delivered another quarter of strong performance, with profit growth outpacing sales growth and driving further margin expansion. Management attributed this performance to disciplined product mix management and a continued focus on profitability. Foodservice remains an important contributor to the company's overall performance.
In addition, the company also began recognizing benefits from lower pork prices, with further benefits expected in future quarters due to cost-recognition timing. Adjusted SG&A expenses, as a percentage of net sales, improved year over year due to lower employee-related expenses and the timing of marketing and advertising investments. The company remains focused on cost discipline and prioritizing high-return SG&A investments.
Overall, continued strength in Foodservice, benefits from lower pork costs and disciplined expense management could help Hormel Foods sustain margin improvement while it works to stabilize Retail volumes and support overall profitability.
The Zacks Rundown for HRLThis Zacks Rank #4 (Sell) company’s shares have lost 21.1% in the past three months compared with the industry’s 13.9% decline.
Image Source: Zacks Investment Research
From a valuation standpoint, HRL trades at a forward price-to-earnings ratio of 12.58, lower than the industry’s average of 13.46.
Image Source: Zacks Investment Research
The Zacks Consensus Estimate for HRL’s current and next fiscal year earnings implies a year-over-year increase of 8% and 3.6%, respectively.
Image Source: Zacks Investment Research
Stocks to ConsiderSome better-ranked stocks have been discussed below:
The Chef’s Warehouse, Inc. (CHEF - Free Report) distributes specialty food and center-of-the-plate products in the United States, the Middle East, and Canada. CHEF currently carries a Zacks Rank of 1 (Strong Buy). You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank stocks here.
The Zacks Consensus Estimate for CHEF’s current fiscal-year sales and earnings indicates growth of 10.8% and 33.7%, respectively, from the year-ago reported figures. CHEF delivered a trailing four-quarter earnings surprise of 30.4%, on average.
Mama’s Creations, Inc. (MAMA - Free Report) , together with its subsidiaries, manufactures and markets fresh deli-prepared foods in the United States. MAMA currently carries a Zacks Rank of 2 (Buy).
The Zacks Consensus Estimate for MAMA's current fiscal-year sales & earnings implies growth of 30.3% and 66.7%, respectively, from the year-ago actuals. MAMA delivered a trailing four-quarter negative earnings surprise of 121.7%, on average.
Medifast, Inc. (MED - Free Report) operates as a health and wellness company that provides habit-based and coach-guided lifestyle solutions to address obesity and support a healthy life in the United States. MED currently carries a Zacks Rank of 2.
The Zacks Consensus Estimate for MED's current fiscal-year sales and earnings implies a decline of 10.8% and 33.7%, respectively, from the year-ago actuals. MED delivered a trailing four-quarter negative earnings surprise of 462.2%, on average.
Proti společnosti Baidu (BIDU) byla podána hromadná žaloba kvůli údajnému nadhodnocování schopnosti byznysu s umělou inteligencí kompenzovat pokles tradičních marketingových aktivit a zkreslování výhledu tržeb.
LOS ANGELES, Oct. 13, 2026 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Schall, Brown & Schwartz LLP (“SBS”), a national shareholder rights litigation firm, reminds investors of a class action lawsuit against Baidu, Inc. (“Baidu” or “the Company”) (NASDAQ: BIDU) for violations of §§10(b) and 20(a) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 and Rule 10b-5 promulgated thereunder by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.
Shareholders who purchased shares of BIDU during the class period listed are encouraged to contact the firm regarding possible lead plaintiff appointments. Appointment as lead plaintiff is not required to partake in any recovery.
CLASS PERIOD: November 18, 2025 to August 17, 2026
DEADLINE: November 13, 2026
If you are a shareholder who suffered a loss, click here to participate.
CASE DETAILS: According to the Complaint, the Company made false and misleading statements to the market. Baidu overstated the ability of its AI business to cover the rapid decline in its legacy marketing business. The Company was likely to suffer a decline in revenue. Based on these facts, the Company’s public statements were false and materially misleading throughout the class period. When the market learned the truth about Baidu, investors suffered damages.
We also encourage you to contact Brian Schall or David Schwartz of Schall, Brown & Schwartz LLP, 2049 Century Park East, Suite 2460, Los Angeles, CA 90067, at 310-301-3335, to discuss your rights free of charge. You can also reach us through the firm's website at www.schallfirm.com, or by email at [email protected].
The class, in this case, has not yet been certified, and until certification occurs, you are not represented by an attorney. If you choose to take no action, you can remain an absent class member.
Join the case to recover your losses
WHY SBS? Schall, Brown & Schwartz LLP represents investors around the world and specializes in securities class action lawsuits and shareholder rights litigation. Bringing together the extensive experience and diverse skillsets of founding partners Brian Schall, Andrew Brown, and David Schwartz, SBS is dedicated to aggressively advocating for every investor.
This press release may be considered Attorney Advertising in some jurisdictions under the applicable law and rules of ethics.
CONTACT:
Schall, Brown & Schwartz LLP
Brian Schall, Esq.,
Andrew Brown, Esq.,
David Schwartz, Esq.,
www.schallfirm.com
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Očekává se, že Commerce Bancshares za čtvrtletí končící v září 2026 vykáže zisk na akcii ve výši 1,07 USD a výnosy 492,85 milionu USD, což představuje meziroční nárůst o 0,9 %, respektive 11,8 %.
Wall Street expects a year-over-year increase in earnings on higher revenues when Commerce Bancshares (CBSH - Free Report) reports results for the quarter ended September 2026. While this widely-known consensus outlook is important in gauging the company's earnings picture, a powerful factor that could impact its near-term stock price is how the actual results compare to these estimates.
The stock might move higher if these key numbers top expectations in the upcoming earnings report, which is expected to be released on October 20. On the other hand, if they miss, the stock may move lower.
While management's discussion of business conditions on the earnings call will mostly determine the sustainability of the immediate price change and future earnings expectations, it's worth having a handicapping insight into the odds of a positive EPS surprise.
Zacks Consensus EstimateThis bank holding company is expected to post quarterly earnings of $1.07 per share in its upcoming report, which represents a year-over-year change of +0.9%.
Revenues are expected to be $492.85 million, up 11.8% from the year-ago quarter.
Estimate Revisions TrendThe consensus EPS estimate for the quarter has been revised 0.22% lower over the last 30 days to the current level. This is essentially a reflection of how the covering analysts have collectively reassessed their initial estimates over this period.
Investors should keep in mind that the direction of estimate revisions by each of the covering analysts may not always get reflected in the aggregate change.
Price, Consensus and EPS Surprise
Earnings WhisperEstimate revisions ahead of a company's earnings release offer clues to the business conditions for the period whose results are coming out. Our proprietary surprise prediction model -- the Zacks Earnings ESP (Expected Surprise Prediction) -- has this insight at its core.
The Zacks Earnings ESP compares the Most Accurate Estimate to the Zacks Consensus Estimate for the quarter; the Most Accurate Estimate is a more recent version of the Zacks Consensus EPS estimate. The idea here is that analysts revising their estimates right before an earnings release have the latest information, which could potentially be more accurate than what they and others contributing to the consensus had predicted earlier.
Thus, a positive or negative Earnings ESP reading theoretically indicates the likely deviation of the actual earnings from the consensus estimate. However, the model's predictive power is significant for positive ESP readings only.
A positive Earnings ESP is a strong predictor of an earnings beat, particularly when combined with a Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy), 2 (Buy) or 3 (Hold). Our research shows that stocks with this combination produce a positive surprise nearly 70% of the time, and a solid Zacks Rank actually increases the predictive power of Earnings ESP.
Please note that a negative Earnings ESP reading is not indicative of an earnings miss. Our research shows that it is difficult to predict an earnings beat with any degree of confidence for stocks with negative Earnings ESP readings and/or Zacks Rank of 4 (Sell) or 5 (Strong Sell).
How Have the Numbers Shaped Up for Commerce?For Commerce, the Most Accurate Estimate is higher than the Zacks Consensus Estimate, suggesting that analysts have recently become bullish on the company's earnings prospects. This has resulted in an Earnings ESP of +1.31%.
On the other hand, the stock currently carries a Zacks Rank of #3.
So, this combination indicates that Commerce will most likely beat the consensus EPS estimate.
Does Earnings Surprise History Hold Any Clue?While calculating estimates for a company's future earnings, analysts often consider to what extent it has been able to match past consensus estimates. So, it's worth taking a look at the surprise history for gauging its influence on the upcoming number.
For the last reported quarter, it was expected that Commerce would post earnings of $1.04 per share when it actually produced earnings of $1.10, delivering a surprise of +5.77%.
Over the last four quarters, the company has beaten consensus EPS estimates three times.
Bottom LineAn earnings beat or miss may not be the sole basis for a stock moving higher or lower. Many stocks end up losing ground despite an earnings beat due to other factors that disappoint investors. Similarly, unforeseen catalysts help a number of stocks gain despite an earnings miss.
That said, betting on stocks that are expected to beat earnings expectations does increase the odds of success. This is why it's worth checking a company's Earnings ESP and Zacks Rank ahead of its quarterly release. Make sure to utilize our Earnings ESP Filter to uncover the best stocks to buy or sell before they've reported.
Commerce appears a compelling earnings-beat candidate. However, investors should pay attention to other factors too for betting on this stock or staying away from it ahead of its earnings release.
Expected Results of an Industry PlayerAmong the stocks in the Zacks Banks - Midwest industry, Commerce Bancshares (CBSH - Free Report) , is soon expected to post earnings of $1.07 per share for the quarter ended September 2026. This estimate indicates a year-over-year change of +0.9%. This quarter's revenue is expected to be $492.85 million, up 11.8% from the year-ago quarter.
The consensus EPS estimate for Commerce has been revised 0.2% lower over the last 30 days to the current level. However, a higher Most Accurate Estimate has resulted in an Earnings ESP of +1.31%.
This Earnings ESP, combined with its Zacks Rank #3 (Hold), suggests that Commerce will most likely beat the consensus EPS estimate. Over the last four quarters, the company surpassed consensus EPS estimates three times.
Stay on top of upcoming earnings announcements with the Zacks Earnings Calendar.
Perpetual Ltd increased its position in shares of Oracle Corporation (NYSE:ORCL – Free Report) by 1,178.6% in the 3rd quarter, according to the company in its most recent disclosure with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The fund owned 220,331 shares of the enterprise software provider’s stock after purchasing an additional 203,099 shares during the period. Perpetual Ltd’s holdings in Oracle were worth $30,251,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.
Other institutional investors also recently bought and sold shares of the company. UBS AM a distinct business unit of UBS ASSET MANAGEMENT AMERICAS LLC grew its stake in shares of Oracle by 0.8% in the 2nd quarter. UBS AM a distinct business unit of UBS ASSET MANAGEMENT AMERICAS LLC now owns 14,680,278 shares of the enterprise software provider’s stock valued at $2,151,395,000 after buying an additional 123,294 shares during the period. Janus Henderson Group PLC increased its holdings in shares of Oracle by 8.6% during the 4th quarter. Janus Henderson Group PLC now owns 14,539,366 shares of the enterprise software provider’s stock worth $2,815,242,000 after buying an additional 1,148,698 shares during the last quarter. Bank of New York Mellon Corp raised its position in shares of Oracle by 3.0% during the 1st quarter. Bank of New York Mellon Corp now owns 13,251,059 shares of the enterprise software provider’s stock valued at $1,949,363,000 after buying an additional 384,984 shares during the period. Amundi raised its position in shares of Oracle by 1.5% during the 2nd quarter. Amundi now owns 9,878,184 shares of the enterprise software provider’s stock valued at $1,447,648,000 after buying an additional 144,087 shares during the period. Finally, Dimensional Fund Advisors LP lifted its holdings in Oracle by 1.7% in the first quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP now owns 8,586,492 shares of the enterprise software provider’s stock valued at $1,262,827,000 after acquiring an additional 147,048 shares during the last quarter. 42.44% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.
Insider Buying and Selling In other news, Director Stephen H. Rusckowski bought 25,000 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Tuesday, September 29th. The stock was bought at an average cost of $139.35 per share, with a total value of $3,483,750.00. Following the transaction, the director directly owned 25,390 shares in the company, valued at $3,538,096.50. The trade was a 6,410.26% increase in their position. The acquisition was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this hyperlink. Also, EVP Maria Smith sold 2,631 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, September 22nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $151.70, for a total transaction of $399,122.70. Following the sale, the executive vice president owned 64,357 shares in the company, valued at $9,762,956.90. This trade represents a 3.93% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale is available in the SEC filing. In the last 90 days, insiders have sold 36,075 shares of company stock valued at $5,342,123. Corporate insiders own 38.40% of the company’s stock.
Key Oracle News Here are the key news stories impacting Oracle this week: Positive Sentiment: Director Stephen Rusckowski reportedly purchased approximately $3.48 million of Oracle shares. The transaction may signal confidence in Oracle’s long-term prospects after the stock’s substantial retreat from its peak. Monster insider trading alert for Oracle stock Positive Sentiment: Commentary highlights Oracle’s reported $664 billion backlog, including major AI infrastructure commitments. Supporters argue that this contracted demand could eventually translate into significant revenue growth and make the recent selloff excessive. Contrarian bet on Oracle Positive Sentiment: Oracle is reportedly transporting natural gas to keep certain AI data-center projects moving while pipeline and permitting delays are addressed. The workaround could help the company meet customer commitments and avoid penalties tied to large contracts. Oracle data centers and natural gas Neutral Sentiment: Oracle’s AI opportunity remains tied to OpenAI and other customers’ ability to expand computing demand. Analysts and commentators are debating whether the large backlog represents durable future revenue or depends on aggressive AI spending assumptions. Oracle has $664 billion lined up Negative Sentiment: Reports that OpenAI’s annualized revenue is near $50 billion, potentially below earlier expectations, have raised questions about its valuation, future infrastructure needs and the economics of Oracle’s reported approximately $300 billion contract. The news has pressured Oracle alongside other AI-related stocks. Why Oracle stock is falling Negative Sentiment: Investors remain focused on Oracle’s substantial borrowing and capital requirements for its AI buildout. Comparisons with Broadcom have intensified concerns that debt financing, construction costs and the timing of cash generation could limit the value of the backlog. Broadcom versus Oracle AI financing Analyst Ratings Changes Several equities research analysts have issued reports on ORCL shares. Phillip Securities cut their target price on Oracle from $275.00 to $237.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research note on Monday, June 15th. Royal Bank Of Canada decreased their price target on Oracle from $190.00 to $165.00 and set a “sector perform” rating on the stock in a research note on Friday, September 11th. Oppenheimer reiterated an “outperform” rating and set a $275.00 price target (up from $235.00) on shares of Oracle in a report on Tuesday, September 8th. Stifel Nicolaus cut their price objective on Oracle from $220.00 to $200.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research report on Friday, September 11th. Finally, Jefferies Financial Group restated a “buy” rating and issued a $290.00 price objective (down from $320.00) on shares of Oracle in a report on Thursday, September 10th. One analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, thirty-six have given a Buy rating, nine have given a Hold rating and one has issued a Sell rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $251.72.
Get Our Latest Analysis on Oracle
Oracle Stock Down 2.8% NYSE:ORCL opened at $137.48 on Tuesday. The company has a quick ratio of 1.17, a current ratio of 1.17 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.89. The stock’s fifty day moving average is $146.25 and its two-hundred day moving average is $159.00. Oracle Corporation has a 52 week low of $114.50 and a 52 week high of $322.54. The stock has a market capitalization of $415.70 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 21.55, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.00 and a beta of 1.78.
Oracle (NYSE:ORCL – Get Free Report) last released its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, September 10th. The enterprise software provider reported $1.92 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $1.74 by $0.18. Oracle had a return on equity of 48.85% and a net margin of 26.36%. The business had revenue of $19.34 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $19.13 billion. During the same period last year, the business posted $1.47 earnings per share. The company’s quarterly revenue was up 29.6% on a year-over-year basis. Oracle has set its Q2 2027 guidance at 1.850-1.930 EPS and its FY 2027 guidance at 8.100-8.100 EPS. Research analysts anticipate that Oracle Corporation will post 6.69 EPS for the current year.
Oracle Announces Dividend The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, October 23rd. Investors of record on Friday, October 9th will be paid a dividend of $0.50 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, October 9th. This represents a $2.00 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.5%. Oracle’s dividend payout ratio is presently 31.35%.
About Oracle (Free Report)
Oracle Corporation (NYSE: ORCL) is a global technology company that develops enterprise software, cloud services and related hardware. Its offerings help businesses manage databases, applications, data, infrastructure and other core information-technology operations.
The company is best known for its Oracle Database, along with cloud-based infrastructure and platform services. Oracle also provides enterprise applications for functions such as finance, human resources, supply-chain management, customer experience and industry-specific operations.
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Key Takeaways Costco's September net sales surged 13% to $30.02 billion, with comparable sales rising 11.4%.Costco's membership growth, digital expansion and plans for 33 warehouse openings support its outlook.COST's forward P/E of 41.55 exceeds the industry's 27.76, suggesting investors wait for a better entry point.
Costco Wholesale Corporation’s (COST - Free Report) September sales update offers fresh insight into the retail giant’s momentum. A dominant force in the warehouse club space with a long track record of growth, Costco has remained an investor favorite. However, the latest sales figures raise a key question: Should investors buy the stock now, hold their positions or book profits?
The September report showed solid comparable sales growth across regions, along with accelerating e-commerce sales. This reinforces the view that Costco’s operational execution and customer loyalty remain strong despite a challenging retail backdrop.
Breaking Down Costco’s September Sales ReportCostco reported net sales of $30.02 billion for the five weeks ended Oct. 4, 2026, representing a 13% increase from $26.58 billion in the year-ago period. Total comparable sales rose 11.4%, reflecting healthy demand across its operating regions. Comparable sales increased 12.5% in the United States, 6.3% in Canada and 10.8% in Other International markets. Excluding the impacts of gasoline price fluctuations and foreign exchange movements, total comparable sales advanced 7.6%.
Costco’s membership-driven business model remains a key competitive strength, with high renewal rates providing a steady revenue stream and reinforcing customer loyalty. Its bulk purchasing power, strong supplier relationships and efficient inventory management enable the retailer to maintain competitive pricing. This value-focused approach resonates with budget-conscious consumers seeking affordability and quality, supporting consistent demand and strengthening Costco’s position in a competitive retail environment. (Read: Costco's September Sales Rise 13% on Strong Comps, Digital Growth)
Unlocking Costco’s Growth DriversCostco continues to stand out as a compelling long-term investment opportunity, supported by its resilient business model, strong customer loyalty and continued market-share gains. The warehouse retailer’s focus on offering quality merchandise at competitive prices continues to attract shoppers and encourage higher spending, even in an uncertain consumer environment. Its ability to cater to both value-conscious households and consumers seeking premium products strengthens its competitive positioning. The continued expansion of its Kirkland Signature private-label portfolio, which offers meaningful savings over national brands without compromising quality, reinforces Costco’s pricing advantage.
The company’s membership-driven business model remains a cornerstone of its long-term investment appeal, providing a dependable recurring revenue stream and supporting sustained customer engagement. Costco ended fiscal 2026 with 84.1 million paid memberships, representing 3.8% growth, while total cardholders increased 3.6% to 150.4 million. Fourth-quarter membership fee income advanced 7.3% to approximately $1,850 million. Worldwide renewal rates improved 10 basis points sequentially to 89.8%, while U.S. and Canadian renewal rates reached 92.3%. The company is also attracting younger consumers, with members under 40 now representing more than a quarter of its membership base.
Growing adoption of Costco’s premium Executive membership tier provides a meaningful opportunity to strengthen customer engagement and increase spending per member. Executive members generally spend more and renew at higher rates than Gold Star members. Costco ended fiscal 2026 with 42.3 million paid Executive members, up 9.4% year over year. These members accounted for 75.6% of total sales. Management believes the combination of membership expansion, stronger Executive penetration and greater spending per member can sustain revenue growth. Targeted digital communications, enhanced membership benefits and personalized engagement initiatives should further reinforce customer loyalty and strengthen Costco’s ability to capture a larger share of household spending.
Costco’s expanding digital capabilities provide another compelling growth avenue as consumers increasingly prioritize convenience, faster fulfillment and seamless shopping experiences. The retailer is strengthening its omnichannel ecosystem through website and mobile application improvements, personalized product recommendations, and expanded delivery partnerships with Instacart, DoorDash and Uber Eats. These initiatives are helping attract younger shoppers and capture additional purchasing occasions beyond traditional warehouse visits. Digitally enabled sales exceeded $33 billion in fiscal 2026, growing more than 20%. Management indicated that third-party delivery sales are largely incremental, complementing rather than replacing warehouse purchases. Costco is also exploring opportunities in artificial intelligence-driven product discovery while improving online product visibility and customer engagement.
Costco’s expanding warehouse network and diversified ancillary businesses further strengthen its long-term growth prospects. The company ended fiscal 2026 with 939 warehouses worldwide and plans to open 33 locations in fiscal 2027, including five relocations. Its longer-term ambition of reaching approximately 30 net new warehouses annually highlights substantial opportunities across underserved U.S. markets and international regions. Alongside physical expansion, Costco continues to broaden its appeal through gasoline, pharmacy and travel services, which provide compelling reasons for members to engage more frequently with the brand. Management plans roughly $7.5 billion in fiscal 2027 capital expenditures, primarily supporting warehouse expansion and supply-chain improvements. These investments should strengthen Costco’s operating capabilities and support sustainable growth over the long term.
Costco Navigates Competitive Landscape as Peers Scale UpCostco's impressive sales figures are part of a larger retail picture where competition is intensifying. Rivals like Dollar General Corporation (DG - Free Report) and Target Corporation (TGT - Free Report) are investing in expanding their product assortments, enhancing supply-chain efficiency and upgrading in-store and digital experiences to capture greater market share. These retailers are also sharpening their value propositions through competitive pricing, private-label expansion and targeted promotional strategies.
Margins remain an area to monitor, as Costco continues to navigate rising costs related to healthcare, general liability, commodities, freight and tariffs. While the company has leveraged productivity initiatives and supply-chain efficiencies to mitigate some pressures, uncertainty around oil prices, tariffs and other input costs could weigh on margin performance.
Does Costco Tick the Boxes for Value Investing?Costco stock has climbed 11.2% year to date compared with the industry’s rise of 8.4%. A sneak peek into key retail peers' performance reveals that shares of Dollar General have tumbled 4.7% during the same time frame, while Target has surged 57.1%.
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Despite Costco’s strong fundamentals, its premium valuation remains a key consideration for investors. The stock has commanded a premium multiple due to its consistency, brand strength and membership economics.
Costco's forward 12-month price-to-earnings ratio stands at 41.55, higher than the industry’s ratio of 27.76. However, it is trading below its 12-month median level of 44.79, indicating some moderation in valuation. Costco is trading at a premium to Target (with a forward 12-month P/E ratio of 15.78) and Dollar General (15.32).
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How Consensus Estimates Stack Up for CostcoThe Zacks Consensus Estimate for Costco’s current fiscal-year sales and earnings per share implies year-over-year growth of 8.2% and 11.7%, respectively. For the next fiscal year, the consensus estimate indicates a 7.1% rise in sales and 9.1% growth in earnings.
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How to Play Costco Stock: Buy, Hold or Sell?Costco’s strong September sales, loyal membership base, expanding digital capabilities and warehouse growth plans reinforce its long-term investment appeal. However, its premium valuation, intensifying competition and lingering cost pressures warrant a measured approach despite encouraging earnings growth expectations. Existing investors may consider holding their positions to benefit from Costco’s long-term growth prospects, while prospective investors should wait for a more attractive entry point before initiating positions.
Costco currently carries a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold). You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here.
Costco uzavřelo fiskální rok 2026 s hotovostí a krátkodobými investicemi ve výši 21,3 miliardy USD oproti dluhu ve výši 6,2 miliardy USD a v roce 2027 plánuje kapitálové výdaje ve výši 7,5 miliardy USD.
Key Takeaways COST's fiscal 2026 cash and short-term investments reached $21.3 billion, far exceeding its $6.2 billion debt.Operating cash flow rose to $15.8 billion, generating $9.4 billion in free cash flow after capex.Costco plans $7.5 billion in fiscal 2027 capital spending for new warehouses and supply-chain investments. Costco Wholesale Corporation (COST - Free Report) continues to demonstrate solid financial strength, supported by substantial cash reserves, manageable debt and robust operating cash flows that provide it with a competitive edge in the retail landscape characterized by evolving consumer spending patterns, inflationary pressures and rising operating costs. Its fiscal 2026 balance sheet highlights a healthy liquidity position and an expanding equity base, providing the warehouse retailer with considerable financial flexibility.
Costco ended fiscal 2026 with cash and cash equivalents of $20,207 million, up from $14,161 million a year earlier. Including short-term investments of $1,094 million, its combined cash and short-term investments reached approximately $21,301 million. Current assets increased to $46,582 million from $38,380 million in the last fiscal year and exceeded current liabilities of $43,952 million.
Total debt stood at approximately $6,162 million, significantly below its cash holdings. While long-term debt, excluding current maturities, declined to $3,914 million from $5,713 million, the current portion of long-term debt increased to $2,248 million from $75 million. Nevertheless, Costco's substantial net cash position provides a cushion, enabling it to meet operating requirements and manage debt obligations.
The company's financial resilience is further reinforced by healthy cash generation. Net cash provided by operating activities increased to $15,825 million in fiscal 2026 from $13,335 million last year. With capital expenditures totaling $6,435 million, Costco generated approximately $9,390 million in free cash flow, demonstrating its ability to fund substantial investments through internally generated resources.
This financial capacity is particularly important as the company plans approximately $7.5 billion in capital expenditures for fiscal 2027, primarily to support new warehouse openings and supply-chain investments. Its strong cash generation provides the flexibility to pursue these growth initiatives while limiting dependence on external financing.
Costco's total assets also increased to $89,045 million from $77,099 million, while stockholders' equity climbed to $35,803 million from $29,164 million. Retained earnings rose to $28,591 million from $22,650 million, strengthening its capital base.
That said, Costco's sizable cash reserves, manageable debt, robust operating cash flows and expanding equity underscore its solid financial foundation. These strengths provide meaningful flexibility to withstand industry challenges, invest in operational improvements and support long-term expansion. While competitors must also balance growth investments with financial obligations, Costco's substantial liquidity and internally generated cash flow reinforce its ability to pursue strategic priorities without placing undue strain on its balance sheet.
Does Costco Have a Balance Sheet Edge Over TGT & BJ?Target Corporation (TGT - Free Report) maintains substantial liquidity, although its debt obligations remain significant. Target ended second-quarter fiscal 2026 with cash and cash equivalents of $5,411 million and total debt of approximately $15,357 million. Target generated $4,519 million in operating cash flow during the first six months, supporting capital investments and shareholder returns. With capital expenditures rising, Target continues to balance liquidity management, debt obligations and strategic investments to strengthen its competitive positioning.
BJ’s Wholesale Club Holdings, Inc. (BJ - Free Report) continues to demonstrate disciplined financial management, supported by healthy cash generation and manageable leverage. BJ’s Wholesale generated $265.5 million in adjusted free cash flow during second-quarter fiscal 2026, while its net leverage remained at 0.5 times. Although BJ’s Wholesale held approximately $30 million in cash against $629.2 million in debt, its improving cash generation supports club expansion and digital investments. BJ’s Wholesale remains focused on balancing growth investments with shareholder returns.
How Does Costco Stack Up Against Its Industry?Costco stock has climbed 11.3% year to date compared with the industry’s rise of 9.8%.
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What Does Costco’s Current Valuation Suggest?Costco's forward 12-month price-to-earnings ratio stands at 41.55, higher than the industry’s ratio of 27.76. However, it is trading below its 12-month median level of 44.79, indicating some moderation in valuation.
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What Do Earnings Estimates Signal for Costco?The Zacks Consensus Estimate for Costco’s current fiscal-year sales and earnings per share implies year-over-year growth of 8.2% and 11.7%, respectively. For the next fiscal year, the consensus estimate indicates a 7.1% rise in sales and 9.1% growth in earnings.
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Costco’s Investment CaseCostco's strong balance sheet, substantial liquidity and robust cash generation reinforce its ability to navigate industry challenges while funding expansion and strategic investments. Its financial flexibility and resilient membership-driven business model support long-term growth prospects. However, inflationary pressures and lingering tariff-related uncertainties warrant caution. Costco currently carries a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold). You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here.
SolarEdge na summitu OCP představí technologii napájení datových center pro AI, která převádí střední napětí na 800 V DC; její konverzní stupeň již v laboratořích funguje pod zátěží.
SolarEdge Technologies, Inc. (NASDAQ: SEDG) today announced that its MVAC-to-800 VDC AI Factory Power Technology for AI data centers is being featured at the NVIDIA AI Factory MGX Ecosystem Showcase during the 2026 Open Compute Project (OCP) Global Summit, October 12–15, at the San Jose McEnery Convention Center in San Jose, California.
The showcase features a SolarEdge solid-state transformer (SST) cell and a 3D-printed model of the company’s containerized data center power architecture, illustrating key elements of the power conversion system SolarEdge is developing for next-generation AI infrastructure.
SolarEdge is developing a full DC powertrain spanning medium-voltage conversion, 800 VDC distribution, protection and monitoring to the rack power input. The three-phase MVAC-to-800 VDC AI Factory Power Technology conversion stage is operating under load in SolarEdge engineering labs, with system-level validation of the full power path underway.
“AI infrastructure is forcing the industry to rethink how power moves from the grid all the way to the rack,” said Shuki Nir, Chief Executive Officer of SolarEdge. “Our work on MVAC-to-800 VDC power architecture is about applying SolarEdge’s deep experience in DC power electronics and protection to that challenge, while working with NVIDIA and the broader ecosystem to help establish the common interfaces and protection principles needed to deploy these architectures at scale.”
The OCP showcase follows recent work between SolarEdge and NVIDIA on protection and grounding considerations for 800 VDC AI data center architectures. In September, SolarEdge published the “800 VDC Protection and Grounding for AI Data Centers” white paper, developed while working with NVIDIA and offered as a technology-neutral framework for industry evaluation. The paper addresses grounding, fault behavior and protection coordination while supporting an open, multi-vendor ecosystem rather than prescribing a single implementation.
Branch-level sensing and interruption, insulation monitoring and system-level monitoring are designed into the architecture SolarEdge is developing. SolarEdge is applying two decades of experience in PV DC power electronics, monitoring and protection to the requirements of high-density AI infrastructure.
The work aligns with broader Open Compute Project efforts to establish common, interoperable infrastructure for increasingly power-dense AI systems, including the evaluation of high-voltage DC architectures and solid-state transformers for scalable data center power distribution.
About SolarEdge
SolarEdge Technologies is a global leader in smart energy technology that applies engineering and innovation to power management across generation, storage and consumption. The company develops DC-optimized power electronics, energy management and optimization solutions, energy storage and grid services, with technology installed in more than 146 countries. SolarEdge is applying two decades of PV DC power electronics and DC protection experience to AI data center infrastructure and is developing an MVAC-to-800 VDC AI Factory Power Technology platform spanning medium-voltage conversion, distribution, protection and monitoring.
Forward-Looking Statements
This press release contains forward-looking statements within the meaning of Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933, as amended, and Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended, which are made pursuant to the safe harbor provisions of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. These forward-looking statements include information, among other things, concerning: the development, validation, performance, cost, reliability, timing of commercial availability and potential adoption of our DC powertrain and other AI data center products; the completion of system-level validation of the full DC path; the publication, evaluation and adoption of, and industry response to, the white paper “800 VDC Protection and Grounding for AI Data Centers”; the anticipated transition of the data center industry to 800 VDC distribution and the pace and extent of that transition; the actions of standards development organizations, testing laboratories and certification bodies; our possible or assumed future results of operations; future demand for our solutions; business strategies; technology developments; financing and investment plans; competitive position; industry and regulatory environment; general economic conditions; potential growth opportunities; and the effects of competition. These forward-looking statements are often characterized by the use of words such as “anticipate,” “believe,” “could,” “seek,” “estimate,” “expect,” “intend,” “may,” “plan,” “potential,” “predict,” “project,” “should,” “will,” “would” or similar expressions and the negative or plural of those terms and other like terminology. Forward-looking statements are based on our current expectations and projections about future events. These forward-looking statements involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors that may cause our actual results, levels of activity, performance or achievements to be materially different from those expressed or implied by the forward-looking statements. Given these factors, you should not place undue reliance on these forward-looking statements.
These factors include, but are not limited to, the matters discussed in the section entitled “Risk Factors” of our Annual Report on Form 10-K/A for the year ended December 31, 2025, filed on March 23, 2026, and other reports filed with the SEC. All information is as of the date of this release. This release does not update or reaffirm any previously issued forward-looking statement, and no statement in this release should be read as a preview of, or as limiting, any information to be presented at the company’s previously announced analyst day. The Company undertakes no duty or obligation to update any forward-looking statements contained in this release as a result of new information, future events or changes in its expectations.
View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20261013444026/en/
NorthCrest Asset Manangement LLC boosted its stake in CF Industries Holdings, Inc. (NYSE:CF – Free Report) by 553.6% in the third quarter, according to the company in its most recent disclosure with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The fund owned 103,390 shares of the basic materials company’s stock after acquiring an additional 87,572 shares during the period. NorthCrest Asset Manangement LLC owned about 0.07% of CF Industries worth $12,950,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.
A number of other institutional investors and hedge funds also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Vertrix Wealth Management LLC purchased a new position in CF Industries in the 3rd quarter valued at $3,604,000. Balefire LLC increased its holdings in CF Industries by 36.8% in the third quarter. Balefire LLC now owns 8,197 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $976,000 after buying an additional 2,207 shares in the last quarter. Wedmont Private Capital raised its holdings in CF Industries by 409.2% during the third quarter. Wedmont Private Capital now owns 15,654 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $1,962,000 after purchasing an additional 12,580 shares during the last quarter. Insight Wealth Strategies LLC raised its stake in shares of CF Industries by 1.6% during the 3rd quarter. Insight Wealth Strategies LLC now owns 55,706 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $6,417,000 after buying an additional 874 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Douglas Lane & Associates LLC raised its position in CF Industries by 465.0% during the third quarter. Douglas Lane & Associates LLC now owns 609,443 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $76,313,000 after acquiring an additional 501,586 shares during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 93.06% of the company’s stock.
Analysts Set New Price Targets Several brokerages have recently issued reports on CF. BMO Capital Markets reduced their price objective on CF Industries from $140.00 to $135.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a research report on Tuesday, June 30th. BNP Paribas Exane lowered their price objective on shares of CF Industries from $140.00 to $120.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a research note on Monday, June 15th. set a $115.00 target price on shares of CF Industries and gave the stock a “sector perform” rating in a research report on Monday, October 5th. KeyCorp initiated coverage on CF Industries in a research report on Thursday, September 10th. They issued an “underweight” rating and a $115.00 price objective on the stock. Finally, Wall Street Zen downgraded shares of CF Industries from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Saturday, July 18th. Two investment analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, six have given a Buy rating, twelve have issued a Hold rating and three have given a Sell rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the company currently has an average rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $121.11.
Read Our Latest Stock Analysis on CF CF Industries Trading Up 2.7% Shares of NYSE CF opened at $114.53 on Tuesday. The company has a market cap of $17.33 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 8.49, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 0.22 and a beta of 0.53. CF Industries Holdings, Inc. has a 12-month low of $75.42 and a 12-month high of $141.96. The company has a current ratio of 4.86, a quick ratio of 4.32 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.36. The stock’s 50 day simple moving average is $123.54 and its 200 day simple moving average is $120.59.
CF Industries (NYSE:CF – Get Free Report) last released its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, August 5th. The basic materials company reported $4.73 EPS for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $5.63 by ($0.90). The firm had revenue of $2.22 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $2.45 billion. CF Industries had a return on equity of 24.41% and a net margin of 27.12%. The firm’s revenue was up 17.6% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the prior year, the company posted $2.37 EPS. Equities research analysts expect that CF Industries Holdings, Inc. will post 13.90 EPS for the current year.
CF Industries Dividend Announcement The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, November 30th. Investors of record on Monday, November 16th will be issued a $0.60 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Monday, November 16th. This represents a $2.40 annualized dividend and a yield of 2.1%. CF Industries’s dividend payout ratio is presently 17.79%.
CF Industries Company Profile (Free Report)
CF Industries Holdings, Inc (NYSE: CF) is a major global producer of nitrogen fertilizer and other nitrogen-based products. The company manufactures ammonia, granular urea, urea ammonium nitrate (UAN), ammonium nitrate and specialty nitrogen products used in agriculture, industrial applications and emissions-control systems.
CF Industries operates a network of production facilities in the United States, Canada and the United Kingdom, serving agricultural and industrial customers in North America and international markets.
Further Reading Five stocks we like better than CF Industries Salesforce Just Got a Rare Double Upgrade—What Changed? OpenAI’s Revenue Scare Could Be a Big Opportunity for Investors China Still Dominates Rare Earths—These 3 U.S. Companies Could Benefit 3 REITs That May Win in a Higher Interest Rate Environment Want to see what other hedge funds are holding CF? Visit HoldingsChannel.com to get the latest 13F filings and insider trades for CF Industries Holdings, Inc. (NYSE:CF – Free Report).
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Pound Sterling-Dollar Forecast: UK Policy Clarity Holds Key to Recovery
BofA expects a medium-term Pound Sterling recovery, but UK policy uncertainty and the US Dollar's appeal during a narrow US equity rally complicate the path.
Bank of America's forecast for the Pound to reach $1.45 by the end of 2027 depends on a recovery that has yet to emerge convincingly from recent trading.
GBP/USD was near $1.3250 at the time of writing, up 0.30% on Tuesday, following a 2.10% fall during September.
Latest-Exchange Rates:
Pound to Dollar (GBP/USD): 1.324505 (+0.26%)
Euro to Dollar (EUR/USD): 1.119239 (+0.29%)
Dollar to Yen (USD/JPY): 158.36742 (-0.10%)
BofA's latest Global FX Weekly retains a $1.37 projection for end-2026, alongside the longer-term $1.45 forecast, which stands roughly 9.4% above the latest rate.
Strategists Michalis Rousakis and Claudio Piron write: "Elsewhere, we maintain a constructive medium-term view on GBP but prefer to await greater clarity on UK policies."
Image: GBP/USD 48hr chart
UK resilience helps, but the policy test remains
Its quantitative FX team writes: "UK data have recently surprised consistently to the upside, while growth expectations have been revised materially higher."
Those observations support Sterling's relative appeal, particularly against a Euro weakened by French fiscal concerns, but they do not remove the uncertainty around Britain's own Budget on 28 October.
Higher government borrowing costs can reflect concern about fiscal credibility as well as expectations of monetary tightening.
In his 8 October speech on financial resilience, Bank of England Governor Andrew Bailey warned that doubts about government finances can drive yields higher and tighten financial conditions.
See our analysis of the Budget's spending-credibility test which explores that risk alongside the protection offered by resilient activity.
BofA nevertheless expects the BoE to respond to the inflation threat.
Its central-bank assessment states: "We changed our BoE call- we now expect the BoE to hike twice in Nov '26 and Feb '27 to 4.25% to guard against risks of second round effects, assuming high energy prices persist into early next year and barring big downside surprises in data."
The BoE held Bank Rate at 3.75% in September, with three of its nine policymakers preferring an increase.
The Dollar has support beyond interest rates
A tighter UK stance would not automatically improve Sterling's yield advantage if US policy also became more restrictive.
BofA's Federal Reserve call remains hawkish, although it acknowledges uncertainty about the number of increases still to come: "We maintain our call for a hike at both the Oct and Dec meeting, though we acknowledge the risks is that we may only get one more hike this year".
The bank also sees investment in US technology companies as an important source of Dollar demand.
Adarsh Sinha and Claudio Piron explain why the composition of the stock-market rally matters: "Intuitively, such breadth measures tell us about the US vs. rest of the world prospects, which are key for the USD exchange rate. A broad rally typically reflects a global growth upswing, with cyclical sectors outperforming and growth differentials versus the US narrowing. In contrast, a technology-led rally reinforces the US exceptionalism narrative, attracting capital inflows and supporting the USD."
For GBP/USD, this means a stronger UK economy can coexist with a firm Dollar if international investors continue concentrating their money in US assets.
Rousakis and Piron write: "However, risks continue to accumulate for already nervous markets, including the ongoing Iran war and associated supply shock, rising concerns about the existential risks posed by AI, the apparent intractability of fiscal challenges, renewed trade tensions and, of course, the upcoming US midterms."
BofA therefore distinguishes a broadening equity rally from a general retreat in share prices.
Sinha and Piron write: "Looking ahead, what would a transition away from a narrow rally regime imply? A broadening would be USD negative from both the equity level & breadth effects, most clearly against high beta FX. An equity correction would be more nuanced: the level effect would be USD positive (except vs. JPY) but dampened if the sell-off is concentrated in large cap technology stocks."
A more widely shared global expansion would give the Pound's recovery a different foundation from a brief rise caused by disappointing US figures.
GBP/USD Exchange Rate FAQ
What is BofA's Pound-Dollar forecast?
The bank projects $1.37 at end-2026 and $1.45 at end-2027.
How far is $1.45 above the current rate?
Roughly 9.4% above the 13 October rate of $1.3250.
Does BofA expect UK interest rates to rise?
Its forecast includes November 2026 and February 2027 increases, conditional on persistent energy costs and no major downside data surprises.
Duke Energy plánuje v letech 2026–2030 investovat 103 miliard USD do výrobních kapacit a elektrické sítě; po hurikánu Isaias obnovila dodávky asi 10 000 zákazníkům na severu Floridy.
Key Takeaways Duke Energy restored approximately 10,000 customers in North Florida following Hurricane Isaias as of Oct. 10.Duke Energy will invest $103 billion during 2026-2030 to expand generation capacity and grid infrastructure.DUK forecasts 6.5% annual EPS growth in 2026 and 2027, while trading at a P/E premium to the industry. Duke Energy (DUK - Free Report) is nearing the completion of power restoration across North Florida following Hurricane Isaias. As of Oct. 10, the company had restored approximately 10,000 customers.
The response highlights the importance of maintaining resilient electricity infrastructure in storm-prone regions. Duke Energy stated that investments in a stronger, smarter grid help reduce outages, shorten their duration and accelerate restoration following severe weather. Although the company did not quantify the specific contribution of these improvements during Isaias, the event underscores the operational value of grid reliability initiatives.
Duke Energy Florida follows a systematic restoration process that prioritizes safety and aims to restore power to the greatest number of customers as quickly as possible. Crews first address downed power lines and then repair critical transmission infrastructure, substations and major distribution lines.
This approach illustrates why utilities need both reliable infrastructure and sufficient emergency-response resources. Severe weather can damage multiple parts of the electricity network simultaneously, requiring coordinated repairs and careful prioritization. For Duke Energy, grid upgrades and operational preparedness remain important elements of its broader strategy to strengthen reliability and serve customer demand.
Duke Energy’s infrastructure strategy extends beyond immediate storm recovery. The company continues to position its approximately $103 billion investment plan for 2026-2030 as a core driver of regulated rate base growth. During the second quarter of 2026, management said DUK was deploying more than $1 billion per month to expand generation capacity and grid infrastructure across its regulated jurisdictions.
Utilities Focus on Grid Modernization and ReliabilityDuke Energy’s response to Hurricane Isaias highlights the operational importance of grid modernization and coordinated restoration efforts. As utilities keep investing in infrastructure, reliability improvements may help protect customers and support long-term service quality.
NextEra Energy (NEE - Free Report) operates Florida Power & Light, one of the state's major electric utilities. Its regulated utility business provides a relevant comparison for investors evaluating grid modernization, electricity reliability and infrastructure investment in the state.
Southern Company (SO - Free Report) serves customers across several southeastern states through its regulated utility businesses. It balances infrastructure investment, reliable service and the financial implications of severe weather while meeting customer demand.
DUK’s Earnings EstimatesThe Zacks Consensus Estimate for 2026 and 2027 EPS indicates an increase of 6.5% each, year over year.
Image Source: Zacks Investment Research
DUK Stock Trading at a PremiumDUK is trading at a premium relative to the industry, with a forward 12-month price-to-earnings of 16.67X compared with the industry average of 14.04X.
Image Source: Zacks Investment Research
DUK Stock Price PerformanceIn the past three months, the company’s shares have lost 6.8% compared with the industry’s 10.6% decline.
Image Source: Zacks Investment Research
DUK’s Zacks RankThe company currently carries a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold). You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here.
Westpac očekává, že NZD/USD dosáhne 0,59 v prosinci 2026 a 0,65 v prosinci 2027, přičemž jej podpoří výnosy z vývozu a další zpřísňování měnové politiky RBNZ.
NZD/USD Forecast: Westpac Targets 0.65 by December 2027 Westpac forecasts a New Zealand Dollar recovery through 2027 despite weaker housing and higher fuel costs, with export incomes cushioning the economy. Currency strategists at Westpac forecast the New Zealand Dollar to recover to US$0.65 by December 2027, even after worsening its assessment of the domestic economy's immediate prospects.
The bank has cut its housing outlook and raised its inflation forecasts, but continues to see enough resilience in exports and employment to keep the recovery going.
That is a demanding backdrop for a currency which fell 4.86% against the US Dollar in September.
At the time of writing, NZD/USD traded at 0.5614, up 0.49% on the day.
Latest — Exchange Rates:
Pound to New Zealand Dollar (GBP/NZD): 2.359005 (-0.23%)
Euro to New Zealand Dollar (EUR/NZD): 1.992836 (-0.24%)
New Zealand Dollar to Dollar (NZD/USD): 0.561345 (+0.48%)
Westpac's nearer target is 0.59 for December 2026, placing much of its projected appreciation beyond the next few months.
Its weekly report, dated 12 October with information current to 9 October, sets out an uneven recovery rather than a rapid improvement in household fortunes.
Kelly Eckhold, Westpac's Chief Economist NZ, writes: "None of those developments, on their own, are enough to derail the recovery. Together, however, they point to a tougher finish to 2026 for households and businesses. We have therefore revisited our near-term inflation, housing and growth forecasts. The broad story remains one of continued economic expansion and gradually improving labour demand, but with a more pronounced inflation spike and slightly less momentum in consumer spending."
Image: NZD to USD exchange rate 48-hour rolling chart as seen 13th October 2026. Export income cushions a weaker housing market The currency forecast sits alongside an economy in which export earnings and property wealth are pulling in different directions.
Westpac now expects national house prices to fall 1.4% in 2026, reversing its previous forecast for a small increase.
Eckhold sees little sign of an imminent turnaround: "The headwinds are familiar: the labour market remains soft, mortgage rates are higher and employment growth is still moderate. Those forces are likely to keep the market subdued for some time, with risks tilted towards another weak year in 2027."
The bank's stronger Kiwi projection therefore cannot be read as a prediction that housing will quickly restore consumer confidence.
Agricultural regions have a more supportive source of income, with the benefit extending beyond farm owners through local spending and employment.
Eckhold says: "Regional outcomes will continue to differ. Tourism- and agriculture-focused areas should benefit from stronger income and employment growth, supported by robust commodity export prices. We have lifted our 2026/27 Fonterra Milk Price forecast to $9.75/kg and set an opening forecast of $9.50/kg for 2027/28."
Those export receipts provide a counterweight to the domestic weakness that has also helped keep Sterling elevated against the Kiwi.
They do not remove the immediate squeeze on households facing dearer petrol and falling property values.
As Eckhold explains: "When petrol absorbs more of the household budget and home values are drifting lower, consumers tend to become more cautious. That combination is likely to crimp discretionary spending in the run-up to Christmas and could take some steam out of the construction recovery."
Higher inflation leaves Westpac's rate forecast unchanged The weaker currency compounds the fuel shock by making imported energy more expensive in New Zealand Dollars.
Westpac expects annual inflation to ease temporarily to 3.7% in September before reaching 4.2% in December, half a percentage point above its previous year-end forecast.
Yet Eckhold has retained his call for the Reserve Bank of New Zealand to pause at the 28 October review and raise the Official Cash Rate to 3% in December.
Eckhold writes: "The latest developments raise headline inflation but, so far, there is little evidence that inflation expectations are moving higher or that the fuel shock is generating broader, persistent price pressure. At the same time, growth risks warrant some caution."
Westpac's forecast table subsequently takes the OCR to 4% by September 2027.
That path would narrow New Zealand's policy-rate disadvantage against the US, where the bank envisages much less additional tightening, offering a potential support for the Kiwi as the recovery develops.
However, higher borrowing costs are already restraining activity before those forecast increases arrive.
Eckhold notes: "Financial conditions have also tightened from an unexpected source: longer-term interest rates have risen markedly over the past six weeks. That increase has at least offset the easing impulse from the lower exchange rate, even though the weaker currency is adding to imported inflation in the near term."
Stats NZ's next selected price indexes release is due on 16 October, ahead of the full September-quarter CPI report on 22 October.
Westpac will be looking beyond petrol for evidence about how widely the pressure is spreading.
Its preview says: "In terms of the big categories, we're forecasting a roughly 6% rise in petrol costs, along with a 0.7% rise in food prices. That's balanced against continued softness in housing rents (which are the single largest component of the CPI)."
NZD/USD exchange rate FAQ What is Westpac's NZD/USD forecast?
Westpac forecasts 0.59 for December 2026 and 0.65 for December 2027.
Why does Westpac see scope for a Kiwi recovery?
Its economic outlook combines strong export incomes and gradually improving hiring with further RBNZ tightening, despite weak housing and higher fuel costs.
When is the next RBNZ rate decision?
The next review is 28 October 2026. Westpac expects a pause, followed by an increase to 3% in December.
Terra Nova Asset Management ve třetím čtvrtletí nově investovala do společnosti Palantir Technologies (PLTR), když nakoupila 7 530 akcií v hodnotě přibližně 1,408 milionu USD.
Terra Nova Asset Management LLC bought a new stake in shares of Palantir Technologies Inc. (NASDAQ:PLTR – Free Report) during the third quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The fund bought 7,530 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $1,408,000.
Several other hedge funds also recently bought and sold shares of PLTR. BlackRock Inc. raised its holdings in Palantir Technologies by 0.4% during the second quarter. BlackRock Inc. now owns 189,817,693 shares of the company’s stock valued at $22,146,030,000 after acquiring an additional 757,322 shares during the period. State Street Corp lifted its position in shares of Palantir Technologies by 2.8% in the second quarter. State Street Corp now owns 104,490,468 shares of the company’s stock valued at $12,190,903,000 after acquiring an additional 2,863,874 shares in the last quarter. Invesco Ltd. lifted its position in shares of Palantir Technologies by 2.8% in the fourth quarter. Invesco Ltd. now owns 22,415,082 shares of the company’s stock valued at $3,984,281,000 after acquiring an additional 616,297 shares in the last quarter. Bank of America Corp DE boosted its stake in shares of Palantir Technologies by 1.0% in the second quarter. Bank of America Corp DE now owns 19,020,265 shares of the company’s stock worth $2,219,094,000 after acquiring an additional 180,486 shares during the period. Finally, Amundi boosted its stake in shares of Palantir Technologies by 7.4% in the second quarter. Amundi now owns 17,623,053 shares of the company’s stock worth $2,056,082,000 after acquiring an additional 1,212,653 shares during the period. Institutional investors own 45.65% of the company’s stock.
Key Headlines Impacting Palantir Technologies Here are the key news stories impacting Palantir Technologies this week:
Positive Sentiment: New sovereign-defense AI venture: Palantir and Ondas announced Regna AI, a standalone company designed to develop and deploy specialized AI models for governments and mission-critical operations involving drones, surveillance systems, ground vehicles and unmanned vessels. The partnership could expand Palantir’s defense reach and reinforce its role as an infrastructure provider regardless of which major AI model wins. Ondas Announces Regna AI, Powered by Palantir, to Advance Sovereign AI Positive Sentiment: Continued AI optimism: Several reports cited rising enterprise AI adoption, potential government contracts and strong demand for Palantir’s software. Bullish analysts, including Dan Ives, expect the company’s growth to continue into 2027, while other coverage pointed to rising earnings estimates and a growing proportion of buy ratings. Dan Ives Remains Bullish on Palantir’s Stock in 2027 Positive Sentiment: Upcoming earnings catalyst: Palantir will report third-quarter 2026 results after the market closes on November 2, with a webcast at 5:00 p.m. ET. Investors will be watching whether its previously reported rapid revenue growth and strong deal activity are continuing. Palantir Announces Date of Third Quarter 2026 Earnings Release and Webcast Neutral Sentiment: Barclays initiated research coverage, adding another institutional view of the stock, but the supplied report did not include its rating or price target. Palantir Technologies Research Coverage Started at Barclays Negative Sentiment: Phillip Securities downgraded Palantir from “strong buy” to “hold.” The action highlights concern that the stock’s valuation—at roughly 179 times earnings and a market capitalization above $500 billion—already discounts exceptional future growth. Analysts also warned that competition and the company’s very high price-to-sales multiple increase downside risk if growth slows. Palantir Stock Moved Down to Hold by Phillip Securities Insider Transactions at Palantir Technologies In related news, insider Jeffrey Buckley sold 1,250 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, August 21st. The stock was sold at an average price of $174.29, for a total transaction of $217,862.50. Following the completion of the transaction, the insider directly owned 56,921 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $9,920,761.09. This represents a 2.15% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through this link. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. The sale was made to cover tax withholding obligations related to the vesting of equity awards. Also, insider Shyam Sankar sold 35,000 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, August 6th. The shares were sold at an average price of $155.70, for a total value of $5,449,500.00. Following the transaction, the insider owned 642,786 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $100,081,780.20. This represents a 5.16% decrease in their position. The SEC filing for this sale provides additional information. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Insiders have sold a total of 536,364 shares of company stock valued at $93,083,303 over the last three months. Corporate insiders own 9.53% of the company’s stock. Analysts Set New Price Targets Several analysts recently issued reports on the company. Cantor Fitzgerald initiated coverage on Palantir Technologies in a research report on Tuesday, August 4th. They set an “overweight” rating for the company. Barclays assumed coverage on Palantir Technologies in a report on Friday. They issued an “overweight” rating and a $265.00 price target on the stock. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft upgraded Palantir Technologies from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating and set a $200.00 price target for the company in a research note on Tuesday, August 4th. Wolfe Research assumed coverage on Palantir Technologies in a research note on Tuesday, August 4th. They issued a “buy” rating for the company. Finally, Oppenheimer lowered shares of Palantir Technologies from an “outperform” rating to a “market perform” rating in a report on Tuesday, August 4th. One analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, twenty-three have issued a Buy rating, ten have issued a Hold rating and three have given a Sell rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, Palantir Technologies has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $200.54.
Get Our Latest Research Report on PLTR
Palantir Technologies Stock Down 0.0% PLTR opened at $209.00 on Tuesday. The firm has a 50-day simple moving average of $179.67 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $150.60. Palantir Technologies Inc. has a 52 week low of $106.37 and a 52 week high of $212.94. The company has a market capitalization of $502.24 billion, a PE ratio of 178.63, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.87 and a beta of 1.60.
Palantir Technologies (NASDAQ:PLTR – Get Free Report) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Monday, August 3rd. The company reported $0.41 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.34 by $0.07. Palantir Technologies had a return on equity of 30.57% and a net margin of 49.01%. The firm had revenue of $1.94 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.81 billion. During the same quarter last year, the business posted $0.16 earnings per share. The business’s quarterly revenue was up 92.8% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, sell-side analysts expect that Palantir Technologies Inc. will post 1.31 earnings per share for the current year.
(Free Report)
Palantir Technologies Inc (NASDAQ: PLTR) develops software platforms that help organizations integrate, analyze and act on large and complex datasets. Its principal platforms include Gotham, which is designed primarily for government and defense applications; Foundry, which supports commercial and institutional data operations; Apollo, which helps deploy and manage software across diverse environments; and the Artificial Intelligence Platform (AIP), which connects large language models and other AI tools with an organization’s data and workflows.
The company serves government agencies, defense and intelligence organizations, and commercial businesses in industries such as manufacturing, healthcare, energy and financial services.
See Also Five stocks we like better than Palantir Technologies Salesforce Just Got a Rare Double Upgrade—What Changed? OpenAI’s Revenue Scare Could Be a Big Opportunity for Investors China Still Dominates Rare Earths—These 3 U.S. Companies Could Benefit 3 REITs That May Win in a Higher Interest Rate Environment Want to see what other hedge funds are holding PLTR? Visit HoldingsChannel.com to get the latest 13F filings and insider trades for Palantir Technologies Inc. (NASDAQ:PLTR – Free Report).
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Palantir měla na konci 2. čtvrtletí objem nasmlouvaných zakázek ve výši 13,1 mld. USD, což představuje meziroční nárůst o 83 % a posiluje její růstový výhled.
Palantir Technologies (PLTR -0.72%) has staged a stunning rally recently, with shares of the artificial intelligence (AI) software specialist rising by a stunning 70% since the beginning of August.
This phenomenal jump in Palantir stock has brought its price to just over $200, as of this writing. Investors may now be wondering whether Palantir can sustain its rally and reach the $300 milestone.
Let's take a closer look at Palantir's prospects in this article and check why it can indeed reach that mark by the end of 2028.
Image source: The Motley Fool.
Investors have finally recognized Palantir's potential While the AI play has primarily focused on hardware-oriented companies in recent years, software will eventually help users increase productivity and unlock the benefits of this technology. Not surprisingly, AI software spending has been increasing rapidly.
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Gartner estimates that AI software spending is poised to jump from $283 billion in 2025 to $452.5 billion this year, a jump of nearly 60%. The trend is poised to continue in 2027, with spending expected to jump to $636 billion. I won't be surprised to see the strong AI software spending environment continuing in 2028, given the technology's productivity gains.
For instance, AI has increased the productivity of software engineers by nearly 33%, as reported by the IT-focused digital publication CIO. This is great news for Palantir. That's because Palantir's Artificial Intelligence Platform (AIP) has been designed to connect generative AI models with an organization's proprietary data, helping them build agents, models, workflows, and other tools so that they can take real-time decisions, reduce redundancy, or increase productivity, among other things.
Moreover, Palantir's AIP has been a massive hit. It has significantly accelerated the company's growth since its launch in April 2023.
Data by YCharts
Given that the AI software market still has significant room for growth, Palantir can sustain its phenomenal growth over the long run, resulting in more stock price upside. In fact, I won't be surprised to see the company breaching the $300 mark by the end of 2028.
Here's the math behind a $300 stock price Analysts expect Palantir's earnings to jump by 116% in 2026 to $1.62 per share. However, as the chart below indicates, consensus estimates suggest it will take two years for Palantir to double its earnings per share again.
Data by YCharts
However, that's unlikely to be the case given Palantir's huge backlog. The company had total remaining deal value (RDV) worth $13.1 billion at the end of Q2, up by 83% over the year-ago period. This metric indicates the total value of unfulfilled contracts at the end of a quarter, which means that Palantir has a robust revenue pipeline.
Also, the company's margin profile has been improving owing to the increased spending by existing customers. For instance, Palantir secured $3.37 billion in new contracts in Q2, well ahead of its quarterly revenue of $1.93 billion. As the company receives more contracts from both existing and new customers, there is a solid chance that its profit margin will increase.
Data by YCharts
Assuming Palantir doubles its bottom line in 2027 and 2028, its earnings per share could jump to $6.48 in 2028. That could be enough to send Palantir's stock price to $300 in the next two years, even if it trades at just 46 times earnings, a significant discount to its earnings multiple of 163 and a small premium to the tech-laden Nasdaq Composite index's earnings multiple of 43.
However, Palantir could maintain a larger premium if it indeed sustains triple-digit earnings growth, opening the possibility of greater gains.
Palantir ve čtvrtletí meziročně zvýšil tržby o 93 %; analytici nyní pro rok 2027 očekávají tržby ve výši 12,3 miliardy USD a zisk na akcii (EPS) 2,3442 USD.
Palantir has posted triple-digit annual gains three years running, and analysts keep raising their estimates even as the stock trades well above their price targets. One number reveals whether $300 per share is a legitimate target or a valuation trap.
Palantir Technologies (NASDAQ:PLTR | PLTR Price Prediction) offers large organizations a simple deal. They can plug any AI model into their operations and still keep their data, logic, and know-how under their own control.
Its AIP platform runs on top of Foundry and Gotham, and that pitch has produced the fastest growth in Palantir’s history. Revenue rose 93% year-over-year last quarter, and CEO Alex Karp called the quarter “otherworldly”.
The stock has rallied sharply. Shares are up 15.52% year-to-date and 20.58% over the past month. They have rose 76% from June’s month-end close of $116.67. So what would it take for Palantir to hit $300 per share in 2027?
Palantir Has Outrun Wall Street’s Price Target
The average price target among analysts is $199.84, about 2.7% below today’s $205.34. The estimates behind that target are moving higher.
Analysts expect 2027 revenue of $12.3 billion, roughly 50% above the 2026 estimate, and EPS of $2.3442, up 45% from $1.6201. Ninety days ago, the 2027 EPS estimate stood at $2.0945. Over the past 30 days it has drawn 26 upward revisions and zero cuts.
Palantir has also beaten EPS estimates in each of the past eight quarters. Last quarter it reported $0.41 against $0.346 expected, extending that run of beats.
Here’s the Math Behind $300 Per Share
At today’s price, Palantir trades at about 88x estimated 2027 earnings. At $300, that multiple rose to about 128x. That is a high premium. Palantir supports it with a Rule of 40 score of 155%, a 62% adjusted operating margin, and 2026 adjusted free cash flow guidance of $4.5 billion to $4.7 billion.
What Could Push Palantir to $300?
Serial guidance raises: Full-year revenue guidance has rose from $7.18 billion to $7.65 billion to $8.15 billion.
U.S. commercial growth: Revenue grew 149% to $764 million, while U.S. commercial TCV reached $2.132 billion.
Customer expansion: Net dollar retention hit 157%, and Palantir closed 220 deals worth $1 million or more.
Management ambition: Karp said, “I am driving the business to grow at a rate equal to or above what we have in U.S. commercial for the next 18 months.”
Government momentum: U.S. government revenue rose 90%. Even so, Department of War revenue remains under 25 basis points of the Pentagon’s budget.
Palantir’s History Shows a 46% Gain Is Within Reach
Hitting $300 requires a 46% gain. Palantir has cleared that bar in three straight years. Shares rose 167% in 2023, 340% in 2024, and 135% in 2025. The stock also swings hard both ways.
It has a beta of 1.6 and fell 65% in 2022. With a market cap near $472.4 billion, triple-digit gains are harder to repeat. A 46% move still fits well within Palantir’s track record.
$300 Is a Stretch, but Palantir Has the Growth Engine
Getting to $300 requires a 46% gain and a forward multiple near 128x. Several things support that case. Estimates keep rising, Palantir keeps beating them, U.S. commercial demand is accelerating, and its sovereign AI pitch is winning over large companies.
Valuation remains the main hurdle. Stock-based compensation of $265 million last quarter is also worth tracking. Yearly returns may vary at this level, and rising estimates, accelerating demand, and consistent beats show how Palantir could see outsized returns in 2027.
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Společnost Albemarle má hodnocení Zacks Rank #5 („silný prodej“), protože konsenzuální odhad zisku na akcii pro aktuální čtvrtletí za posledních 30 dní klesl o 24,9 %.
Albemarle (ALB - Free Report) has been one of the most searched-for stocks on Zacks.com lately. So, you might want to look at some of the facts that could shape the stock's performance in the near term.
Over the past month, shares of this specialty chemicals company have returned -14.4%, compared to the Zacks S&P 500 composite's +2.1% change. During this period, the Zacks Chemical - Diversified industry, which Albemarle falls in, has lost 4.8%. The key question now is: What could be the stock's future direction?
Although media reports or rumors about a significant change in a company's business prospects usually cause its stock to trend and lead to an immediate price change, there are always certain fundamental factors that ultimately drive the buy-and-hold decision.
Earnings Estimate RevisionsRather than focusing on anything else, we at Zacks prioritize evaluating the change in a company's earnings projection. This is because we believe the fair value for its stock is determined by the present value of its future stream of earnings.
Our analysis is essentially based on how sell-side analysts covering the stock are revising their earnings estimates to take the latest business trends into account. When earnings estimates for a company go up, the fair value for its stock goes up as well. And when a stock's fair value is higher than its current market price, investors tend to buy the stock, resulting in its price moving upward. Because of this, empirical studies indicate a strong correlation between trends in earnings estimate revisions and short-term stock price movements.
For the current quarter, Albemarle is expected to post earnings of $2.44 per share, indicating a change of +1384.2% from the year-ago quarter. The Zacks Consensus Estimate has changed -24.9% over the last 30 days.
For the current fiscal year, the consensus earnings estimate of $11.25 points to a change of +1524.1% from the prior year. Over the last 30 days, this estimate has changed -1.3%.
For the next fiscal year, the consensus earnings estimate of $11.11 indicates a change of -1.2% from what Albemarle is expected to report a year ago. Over the past month, the estimate has changed +0.4%.
With an impressive externally audited track record, our proprietary stock rating tool -- the Zacks Rank -- is a more conclusive indicator of a stock's near-term price performance, as it effectively harnesses the power of earnings estimate revisions. The size of the recent change in the consensus estimate, along with three other factors related to earnings estimates, has resulted in a Zacks Rank #5 (Strong Sell) for Albemarle.
The chart below shows the evolution of the company's forward 12-month consensus EPS estimate:
12 Month EPS
Projected Revenue GrowthWhile earnings growth is arguably the most superior indicator of a company's financial health, nothing happens as such if a business isn't able to grow its revenues. After all, it's nearly impossible for a company to increase its earnings for an extended period without increasing its revenues. So, it's important to know a company's potential revenue growth.
In the case of Albemarle, the consensus sales estimate of $1.49 billion for the current quarter points to a year-over-year change of +14.2%. The $6.08 billion and $6.32 billion estimates for the current and next fiscal years indicate changes of +18.2% and +4%, respectively.
Last Reported Results and Surprise HistoryAlbemarle reported revenues of $1.74 billion in the last reported quarter, representing a year-over-year change of +31.1%. EPS of $3.75 for the same period compares with $0.11 a year ago.
Compared to the Zacks Consensus Estimate of $1.59 billion, the reported revenues represent a surprise of +9.94%. The EPS surprise was +11.94%.
Over the last four quarters, Albemarle surpassed consensus EPS estimates three times. The company topped consensus revenue estimates each time over this period.
ValuationWithout considering a stock's valuation, no investment decision can be efficient. In predicting a stock's future price performance, it's crucial to determine whether its current price correctly reflects the intrinsic value of the underlying business and the company's growth prospects.
Comparing the current value of a company's valuation multiples, such as its price-to-earnings (P/E), price-to-sales (P/S), and price-to-cash flow (P/CF), to its own historical values helps ascertain whether its stock is fairly valued, overvalued, or undervalued, whereas comparing the company relative to its peers on these parameters gives a good sense of how reasonable its stock price is.
As part of the Zacks Style Scores system, the Zacks Value Style Score (which evaluates both traditional and unconventional valuation metrics) organizes stocks into five groups ranging from A to F (A is better than B; B is better than C; and so on), making it helpful in identifying whether a stock is overvalued, rightly valued, or temporarily undervalued.
Albemarle is graded C on this front, indicating that it is trading at par with its peers. Click here to see the values of some of the valuation metrics that have driven this grade.
Bottom LineThe facts discussed here and much other information on Zacks.com might help determine whether or not it's worthwhile paying attention to the market buzz about Albemarle. However, its Zacks Rank #5 does suggest that it may underperform the broader market in the near term.
Perpetual Ltd increased its position in Micron Technology, Inc. (NASDAQ:MU – Free Report) by 408.7% in the 3rd quarter, according to the company in its most recent disclosure with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The firm owned 42,495 shares of the semiconductor manufacturer’s stock after purchasing an additional 34,141 shares during the quarter. Perpetual Ltd’s holdings in Micron Technology were worth $45,262,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.
Other institutional investors have also recently bought and sold shares of the company. Bullseye Investment Management LLC acquired a new position in shares of Micron Technology in the 2nd quarter valued at $27,000. Aventus Investment Advisors Inc. bought a new position in shares of Micron Technology during the 3rd quarter worth about $30,000. Steph & Co. acquired a new stake in shares of Micron Technology during the 3rd quarter valued at about $31,000. Montgomery Financial Services LLC acquired a new stake in shares of Micron Technology during the 2nd quarter valued at about $38,000. Finally, JNBA Financial Advisors boosted its position in shares of Micron Technology by 77.3% during the 2nd quarter. JNBA Financial Advisors now owns 39 shares of the semiconductor manufacturer’s stock valued at $45,000 after acquiring an additional 17 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 80.84% of the company’s stock.
Insiders Place Their Bets In other news, CEO Sanjay Mehrotra sold 40,000 shares of Micron Technology stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, August 21st. The shares were sold at an average price of $968.90, for a total value of $38,756,000.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer owned 264,503 shares in the company, valued at approximately $256,276,956.70. The trade was a 13.14% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is accessible through this link. Also, EVP Sumit Sadana sold 15,000 shares of Micron Technology stock in a transaction on Tuesday, August 18th. The shares were sold at an average price of $934.29, for a total value of $14,014,350.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the executive vice president owned 191,021 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $178,469,010.09. The trade was a 7.28% decrease in their position. The SEC filing for this sale provides additional information. Over the last ninety days, insiders have sold 95,879 shares of company stock valued at $90,939,466. 0.24% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.
Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth MU has been the topic of a number of analyst reports. The Goldman Sachs Group set a $1,250.00 target price on shares of Micron Technology in a research note on Thursday, October 1st. DA Davidson raised their price target on shares of Micron Technology from $2,100.00 to $3,000.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Wednesday, October 7th. Arete Research lifted their price objective on Micron Technology from $852.00 to $1,500.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Tuesday, July 21st. Daiwa Securities Group lifted their price objective on Micron Technology from $1,600.00 to $1,700.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Friday, July 17th. Finally, President Capital upped their price objective on Micron Technology to $1,500.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Friday, July 17th. One research analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, forty-one have issued a Buy rating and four have issued a Hold rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $1,407.88. View Our Latest Report on MU
Micron Technology Stock Down 3.9% Shares of NASDAQ:MU opened at $989.04 on Tuesday. The company’s fifty day moving average is $983.23 and its 200-day moving average is $849.12. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.03, a quick ratio of 2.94 and a current ratio of 3.31. Micron Technology, Inc. has a 52 week low of $186.25 and a 52 week high of $1,255.00. The company has a market capitalization of $1.12 trillion, a PE ratio of 13.33, a P/E/G ratio of 0.18 and a beta of 2.22.
Micron Technology (NASDAQ:MU – Get Free Report) last announced its earnings results on Wednesday, September 30th. The semiconductor manufacturer reported $33.42 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $31.77 by $1.65. Micron Technology had a net margin of 63.80% and a return on equity of 92.62%. The business had revenue of $54.23 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $51.33 billion. During the same quarter last year, the company posted $3.03 EPS. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was up 379.1% on a year-over-year basis. Micron Technology has set its Q1 2027 guidance at 37.150-39.150 EPS. Equities research analysts predict that Micron Technology, Inc. will post 175.82 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.
Micron Technology Dividend Announcement The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, October 29th. Shareholders of record on Wednesday, October 14th will be paid a dividend of $0.15 per share. This represents a $0.60 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.1%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Wednesday, October 14th. Micron Technology’s dividend payout ratio is currently 0.81%.
More Micron Technology News Here are the key news stories impacting Micron Technology this week:
Positive Sentiment: Micron increased its share-repurchase authorization to a record $35.16 billion, with buybacks expected to begin shortly. The plan signals management’s confidence in cash generation and could support earnings per share. Why Is Micron Stock Rising Today? Positive Sentiment: Micron’s latest results substantially exceeded expectations, with $54.23 billion in revenue and $33.42 in adjusted EPS, while revenue surged 379% year over year. Analysts remain optimistic about AI-related memory demand, tight DRAM supply and long-term customer agreements. One bullish analyst raised a price target to $3,000, while several research firms continue to rate MU favorably. Micron: More For Longer Neutral Sentiment: Despite the recent pullback, valuation screens continue to identify Micron as an attractive value and growth stock, with a low forward earnings multiple and strong earnings momentum. However, investor sentiment remains cautious after the stock’s substantial year-to-date advance. Micron Is a Top-Ranked Value Stock Negative Sentiment: China’s ChangXin Memory Technologies (CXMT) reported progress on a denser “4F square” DRAM design aimed at server memory. The development has renewed concerns that Chinese competition could eventually pressure Micron’s pricing power, margins and market share. Micron Stock Falls on Competition From China Rival CXMT Negative Sentiment: Elon Musk’s warning regarding Chinese memory chips added to the market’s concerns, while a broader selloff in semiconductor shares and weakness in South Korean technology stocks amplified pressure on MU. Micron Stock Falls Again as Musk Issues Warning on Chinese Memory Negative Sentiment: Investors are also questioning whether AI infrastructure spending can remain strong after Australian data-center company Firmus canceled its IPO because of weak demand. Any slowdown in AI investment could reduce future demand for Micron’s high-value memory products. Nvidia and Micron Received Bad News From an Unlikely Place Micron Technology Profile (Free Report)
Micron Technology, Inc is a semiconductor company that develops and manufactures memory and storage solutions. Its product portfolio includes dynamic random-access memory (DRAM), NAND flash memory, three-dimensional XPoint-related technologies, solid-state drives, and high-bandwidth memory products designed for demanding computing applications.
The company serves customers across the data center, artificial intelligence, networking, automotive, industrial, mobile, consumer electronics, and embedded markets.
Featured Articles Five stocks we like better than Micron Technology Salesforce Just Got a Rare Double Upgrade—What Changed? OpenAI’s Revenue Scare Could Be a Big Opportunity for Investors China Still Dominates Rare Earths—These 3 U.S. Companies Could Benefit 3 REITs That May Win in a Higher Interest Rate Environment
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Micron Technology dosáhla ve 4. čtvrtletí fiskálního roku 2026 hrubé marže 87 %; rychlejší náběh HBM4 a vyšší ceny kontraktů na rok 2027 mohou marže dále podpořit.
Key Takeaways Micron's HBM4 ramp-up and higher contract prices could lift margins further amid robust AI memory demand.MU's Q4'26 gross margin hit 87%, while HBM4 production is ramping twice as fast as HBM3E.Micron secured most 2027 HBM supply deals at higher prices, potentially narrowing the margin gap with DRAM. Micron Technology, Inc. (MU - Free Report) is positioned to benefit from the rising demand for high-bandwidth memory (HBM) as AI companies build more powerful data centers. Its HBM4 ramp-up could support further margin growth if strong demand, higher prices and efficient production continue.
Micron’s fourth-quarter 2026 revenues jumped 379.3% year over year to $54.23 billion, while the full fiscal 2026 top line surged 256.3% to $133.19 billion. The fourth-quarter non-GAAP gross margin reached 87%, up from 45.7% in the year-ago quarter. The company’s full fiscal 2026 gross margin reached 81.1% from 41.1% in fiscal 2025, highlighting the benefits of favorable memory pricing and strong demand.
HBM is an important part of this opportunity. Micron reported that HBM revenues grew faster than total company revenues in the fourth quarter. It has also completed agreements covering most of its HBM bit supply for calendar year 2027, with significantly higher prices than the previous year. These agreements offer better revenue visibility and could help support profitability as shipments increase.
Micron’s HBM4 progress adds another growth opportunity. The company said its 12-high HBM4 production ramp-up is advancing twice as fast as the comparable HBM3E generation, and it has already shipped more than $1 billion in HBM4 revenues. Faster production growth and better manufacturing yields could help reduce costs and improve returns as volumes rise.
Pricing is another potential margin driver. Micron has secured most of its 2027 HBM supply agreements at significantly higher year-over-year prices. Management expects these prices to narrow the gross-margin gap between HBM and conventional DRAM. However, the actual benefit will depend on production costs, product yields and how quickly shipments increase.
Micron’s HBM4 ramp-up and higher contract prices provide a strong foundation for further margin improvement. Its 87% fourth-quarter gross margin already reflects favorable market conditions, but sustaining such high levels will depend on execution and continued AI spending. For the first quarter of fiscal 2027, Micron expects non-GAAP gross margin of approximately 86.25%.
How Do Rivals Fare Against Micron in AI Memory Space?Micron’s major competitors, SK hynix (SKHY - Free Report) and Sandisk Corporation (SNDK - Free Report) , are also benefiting from AI-led demand for memory and storage solutions.
SK hynix is one of Micron’s closest DRAM rivals and has a strong position in HBM, which is critical for AI accelerators. In the second quarter of 2026, SK hynix generated 79.3 trillion Korean won in revenues, up 257% year over year, while operating profit surged 557% to 60.5 trillion won. HBM, AI-server DRAM and enterprise SSDs drove the strong results.
Sandisk is more focused on NAND and storage than DRAM, but it is another stock that stands to benefit from AI infrastructure spending. Its fiscal 2026 revenues jumped 175% to $20.25 billion, while data-center revenues soared 437% to $5.15 billion. Sandisk’s fourth-quarter fiscal 2026 revenues also surged 372% sequentially to $8.97 billion, showing strong demand for storage products used in data centers.
Both companies highlight the broadening AI-driven demand for memory and storage, although Micron remains particularly well-positioned in DRAM and HBM.
Micron’s Price Performance, Valuation & EstimatesShares of Micron have surged 246.5% year to date compared with the Zacks Computer and Technology sector’s return of 23.4%.
From a valuation standpoint, MU trades at a forward price-to-earnings ratio of 5.47, significantly lower than the sector’s average of 20.93.
Micron Technology 12-Month Forward P/E Ratio
Image Source: Zacks Investment Research
The Zacks Consensus Estimate for Micron’s fiscal 2027 and 2028 earnings implies year-over-year increases of 133.9% and 20.6%, respectively. Bottom-line estimates for fiscal 2027 and 2028 have been revised upward over the past 30 days.
Image Source: Zacks Investment Research
Micron currently sports a Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy). You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank stocks here.
Woodstock Corp lifted its holdings in shares of Intuitive Surgical, Inc. (NASDAQ:ISRG – Free Report) by 4.3% during the third quarter, according to its most recent 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The firm owned 84,643 shares of the medical equipment provider’s stock after purchasing an additional 3,503 shares during the period. Intuitive Surgical comprises approximately 2.8% of Woodstock Corp’s investment portfolio, making the stock its 8th largest holding. Woodstock Corp’s holdings in Intuitive Surgical were worth $34,418,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.
Several other institutional investors also recently added to or reduced their stakes in ISRG. Invesco Ltd. boosted its stake in Intuitive Surgical by 17.4% in the fourth quarter. Invesco Ltd. now owns 4,128,735 shares of the medical equipment provider’s stock valued at $2,338,350,000 after acquiring an additional 611,268 shares during the last quarter. Bank of America Corp DE grew its holdings in Intuitive Surgical by 3.3% during the first quarter. Bank of America Corp DE now owns 3,616,973 shares of the medical equipment provider’s stock valued at $1,667,388,000 after purchasing an additional 116,292 shares during the period. Bank of New York Mellon Corp purchased a new stake in Intuitive Surgical in the second quarter worth $1,335,753,000. Amundi increased its position in Intuitive Surgical by 8.6% in the first quarter. Amundi now owns 2,428,356 shares of the medical equipment provider’s stock worth $1,119,448,000 after buying an additional 193,096 shares during the last quarter. Finally, J. Stern & Co. LLP increased its position in Intuitive Surgical by 18,504.6% in the fourth quarter. J. Stern & Co. LLP now owns 2,127,248 shares of the medical equipment provider’s stock worth $1,204,788,000 after buying an additional 2,115,814 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors own 83.64% of the company’s stock.
Wall Street Analyst Weigh In ISRG has been the subject of several research reports. UBS Group assumed coverage on Intuitive Surgical in a research note on Tuesday, July 28th. They set a “neutral” rating and a $500.00 price target for the company. Leerink Partners cut their target price on shares of Intuitive Surgical from $573.00 to $454.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a research report on Friday, July 17th. Citigroup lowered their price target on shares of Intuitive Surgical from $590.00 to $500.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research report on Friday, July 17th. HSBC downgraded shares of Intuitive Surgical from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating and set a $391.00 price objective for the company. in a report on Thursday, July 30th. Finally, Mizuho set a $500.00 target price on Intuitive Surgical and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research report on Wednesday, July 15th. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, twenty-one have given a Buy rating, eight have given a Hold rating and one has assigned a Sell rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $501.98.
View Our Latest Report on ISRG Insider Buying and Selling at Intuitive Surgical In related news, VP Fredrik Widman sold 1,089 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, September 15th. The stock was sold at an average price of $374.44, for a total value of $407,765.16. Following the sale, the vice president directly owned 1,026 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $384,175.44. This trade represents a 51.49% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this link. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Also, Director Gary S. Guthart sold 10,000 shares of Intuitive Surgical stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, August 11th. The stock was sold at an average price of $400.00, for a total value of $4,000,000.00. Following the completion of the sale, the director owned 1,245,679 shares in the company, valued at approximately $498,271,600. This represents a 0.80% decrease in their ownership of the stock. Additional details regarding this sale are available in the official SEC disclosure. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Over the last three months, insiders sold 12,370 shares of company stock valued at $4,891,989. 0.60% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.
Intuitive Surgical Stock Performance Shares of ISRG stock opened at $427.64 on Tuesday. The company has a market capitalization of $151.08 billion, a PE ratio of 48.99, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.20 and a beta of 1.46. Intuitive Surgical, Inc. has a 52-week low of $328.57 and a 52-week high of $603.88. The business’s fifty day moving average is $387.41 and its 200 day moving average is $410.47.
Intuitive Surgical (NASDAQ:ISRG – Get Free Report) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, July 16th. The medical equipment provider reported $2.80 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.48 by $0.32. Intuitive Surgical had a return on equity of 16.91% and a net margin of 28.45%. The firm had revenue of $2.89 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $2.83 billion. During the same quarter last year, the company posted $1.81 EPS. The company’s revenue for the quarter was up 18.4% on a year-over-year basis. On average, sell-side analysts forecast that Intuitive Surgical, Inc. will post 8.87 EPS for the current fiscal year.
(Free Report)
Intuitive Surgical, Inc develops and commercializes robotic-assisted systems and related technologies designed to support minimally invasive medical procedures. The company’s products are intended to help surgeons perform operations through small incisions while providing enhanced visualization, precision, and control.
Its principal product is the da Vinci Surgical System, a platform used across a range of specialties, including general surgery, urology, gynecology, thoracic surgery, and cardiac procedures.
Further Reading Five stocks we like better than Intuitive Surgical Salesforce Just Got a Rare Double Upgrade—What Changed? OpenAI’s Revenue Scare Could Be a Big Opportunity for Investors China Still Dominates Rare Earths—These 3 U.S. Companies Could Benefit 3 REITs That May Win in a Higher Interest Rate Environment
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Společnost Perpetual Ltd ve třetím čtvrtletí snížila svůj podíl v Abbott Laboratories o 5,6 % prodejem 26 238 akcií. Na konci období držela 444 048 akcií v hodnotě 43 885 000 USD.
Perpetual Ltd trimmed its position in Abbott Laboratories (NYSE:ABT – Free Report) by 5.6% during the third quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The institutional investor owned 444,048 shares of the healthcare product maker’s stock after selling 26,238 shares during the quarter. Perpetual Ltd’s holdings in Abbott Laboratories were worth $43,885,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.
Several other large investors have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Cornerstone Financial Management LLC bought a new stake in shares of Abbott Laboratories in the fourth quarter valued at about $25,000. Purpose Unlimited Inc. bought a new position in Abbott Laboratories during the fourth quarter worth about $25,000. Portfolio Resources Advisor Group Inc. acquired a new stake in Abbott Laboratories in the 4th quarter worth about $26,000. Abound Financial LLC acquired a new stake in Abbott Laboratories in the 4th quarter worth about $26,000. Finally, Manning & Napier Advisors LLC acquired a new stake in Abbott Laboratories in the 2nd quarter worth about $31,000. Institutional investors own 75.18% of the company’s stock.
Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth A number of research analysts have issued reports on the stock. Wells Fargo & Company increased their target price on shares of Abbott Laboratories from $109.00 to $112.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research report on Friday, July 17th. Rothschild & Co Redburn raised shares of Abbott Laboratories from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and raised their target price for the stock from $119.00 to $127.00 in a report on Friday, October 2nd. Citigroup lifted their price target on shares of Abbott Laboratories from $108.00 to $112.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Friday, July 17th. TD Cowen reiterated a “buy” rating and issued a $135.00 price target on shares of Abbott Laboratories in a research note on Tuesday, September 8th. Finally, Barclays initiated coverage on Abbott Laboratories in a research note on Wednesday, October 7th. They issued an “overweight” rating and a $120.00 price target for the company. Three investment analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, twenty-one have assigned a Buy rating and four have issued a Hold rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat, the company has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $118.88.
Read Our Latest Analysis on ABT Abbott Laboratories Stock Performance ABT opened at $101.79 on Tuesday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.57, a quick ratio of 0.97 and a current ratio of 1.38. Abbott Laboratories has a 52-week low of $81.97 and a 52-week high of $133.34. The firm has a market cap of $176.13 billion, a P/E ratio of 32.94, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.85 and a beta of 0.59. The business’s fifty day moving average is $106.14 and its 200-day moving average is $98.29.
Abbott Laboratories (NYSE:ABT – Get Free Report) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, July 16th. The healthcare product maker reported $1.31 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.28 by $0.03. The business had revenue of $12.59 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $12.52 billion. Abbott Laboratories had a return on equity of 17.69% and a net margin of 11.65%. Abbott Laboratories’s revenue for the quarter was up 13.0% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm earned $1.26 earnings per share. Abbott Laboratories has set its Q3 2026 guidance at 1.380-1.46 EPS and its FY 2026 guidance at 5.450-5.60 EPS. Sell-side analysts expect that Abbott Laboratories will post 5.52 EPS for the current fiscal year.
Abbott Laboratories Announces Dividend The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, November 16th. Shareholders of record on Thursday, October 15th will be issued a $0.63 dividend. This represents a $2.52 annualized dividend and a yield of 2.5%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, October 15th. Abbott Laboratories’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is currently 81.55%.
(Free Report)
Abbott Laboratories (NYSE:ABT) is a diversified healthcare company that develops, manufactures and sells medical devices, diagnostic products, nutritional products and branded generic pharmaceuticals. Founded in 1888 by Wallace C. Abbott, the company serves healthcare providers, institutions, retailers and consumers worldwide.
Abbott’s medical device portfolio includes cardiovascular products, such as coronary stents, structural heart systems and heart failure devices, as well as diabetes-care technologies, including the FreeStyle Libre continuous glucose monitoring system.
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Abbott očekává ve 3. čtvrtletí 2026 zisk na akcii ve výši 1,42 USD, což by představovalo meziroční nárůst o 9,2 %, a tržby ve výši 12,91 miliardy USD, meziročně vyšší o 13,5 %.
Key Takeaways Abbott is expected to report Q3 EPS of $1.42, up 9.2%, and revenues of $12.91 billion, up 13.5%.ABT's Diagnostics revenues may surge 45.9%, led by cancer testing, Alinity platform growth and Exact Sciences.ABT shares gained 7.2% in Q3, while its forward P/E of 16.71X remains below its five-year median of 23.03X. Abbott Laboratories (ABT - Free Report) is slated to report its third-quarter 2026 results on Oct. 21, before the opening bell.
The Zacks Consensus Estimate for the company’s third-quarter earnings per share (EPS) suggests 9.2% year-over-year growth to $1.42. The estimate has remained constant in the past 60 days. The consensus mark for third-quarter revenues currently stands at $12.91 billion, implying a 13.5% increase over the prior-year period.
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In the trailing four quarters, the company topped earnings estimates twice and broke even on two occasions, the average surprise being 0.81%.
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Q3 Earnings Whispers for AbbottPer our proven model, a stock with a Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy), 2 (Buy) or 3 (Hold), along with a positive Earnings ESP, has a higher chance of beating estimates. This is not the case here, as you can see below.
Earnings ESP: Abbott has an Earnings ESP of 0.00%. You can uncover the best stocks to buy or sell before they are reported with our Earnings ESP Filter.
Zacks Rank: The company currently carries a Zacks Rank #2. You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks Rank #1 stocks here.
What May Have Influenced ABT’s Q3 Performance?DiagnosticsThebusiness is likely to have continued to seestrong and stable testing demand in the third quarter of 2026. Within this, Core Laboratory may have delivered another robust performance in the United States while extending its solid track record in Latin America, reflecting continued growth in diagnostic test sales on the Alinity platform. Rapid and Molecular Diagnostics results may improve following the end of a weaker-than-normal respiratory virus season in the second quarter.
Abbott’s acquisition of Exact Sciences has strengthened its position in cancer diagnostics and broadened its portfolio with products including Cologuard, Oncotype DX and Cancerguard. Cancer Diagnostics may have contributed to third-quarter sales growth, with Cologuard benefiting from a growing base of new and repeat users as well as growth in precision oncology and international markets.
The business may have also benefited from higher volumes through care gap programs, recently launched tests and continued international adoption, in line with management’s expectation of stronger growth in the second half of 2026 than in the first half.
The Zacks Consensus Estimate anticipates Diagnostics revenues to increase 45.9% year over year.
Established Pharmaceutical Products (“EPD”)Similar to the previous quarter, the segment is likely to have seen broad-based growth across the largest markets, including India, Latin America and Southeast Asia. Demand for health care in these emerging markets may have remained a key growth driver, supported by expanding access to care, aging populations and a rising need to treat both acute and chronic conditions. Abbott’s expanding biosimilars portfolio, which includes several leading oncology therapies, may have helped it meet growing demand across these markets and support revenues.
The Zacks Consensus Estimate suggests EPD revenues will grow 6.8% from the prior-period levels.
Medical DevicesAbbott’s cardiovascular businesses are expected to have accounted for the largest share of Medical Devices’ sales in the third quarter of 2026. Electrophysiology may have benefited from the transition of the Volt 2.0 PFA catheter to a full U.S. market release. Internationally, the continued rollout of Volt Pulsed Field Ablation and TactiFlex Duo Ablation Catheter, Sensor Enabled, may have continued to gain strong traction, aiding revenues. During the quarter, Abbott secured FDA approval for TactiFlex Duo and CE Mark approval of Amulet 360 Left Atrial Appendage (LAA) Occluder, which is intended for people with atrial fibrillation at risk of stroke.
In Rhythm Management, the continued expansion of AVEIR across single- and dual-chamber pacemaker segments may have supported revenues, alongside broader international adoption. Heart Failure performance in the United States is expected to have been driven by Abbott’s heart assist devices portfolio. Vascular sales may have benefited from growth in endovascular products.
The Diabetes Care business is likely to have maintained its growth momentum, led by continued growth in Abbott’s continuous glucose monitoring (CGM) systems in the United States and internationally. The company’s CE Mark approval for Libre Duo earlier this year may have also favored the quarter’s top line. The two-in-one biowearable provides real-time visibility into both glucose and ketone levels.
The Zacks Consensus Estimate expects Medical Devices revenues to increase 7.8% year over year.
NutritionIn the third quarter of 2026, the segment may have seen improving trends in both Pediatric and Adult Nutrition. International Pediatric Nutrition may have sustained its sales growth in the third quarter, having been the first of Abbott’s Nutrition businesses to return to positive growth. In the U.S. market, sales are likely to have continued to benefit from recent WIC contract wins.
Abbott may have also continued to see positive volume trends in Adult Nutrition following price actions implemented late last year. Product innovations, including new versions of Ensure featuring higher protein, lower sugar and refreshed labeling and packaging, may have supported the quarter’s sales. In August 2026, Abbott marked the U.S. launch of Similac360 Total Care Made With Whole Milk, the first and only commercially sterile, ready-to-feed liquid infant formula made with whole milk.
The Zacks Consensus Estimate indicates Nutrition revenues will rise 2.7% year over year.
ABT Peers: Upcoming ReleasesLabcorp Holdings (LH - Free Report) is set to report third-quarter 2026 results on Oct. 28, before the opening bell. Strength in both Diagnostics and Biopharma Laboratory Services businesses is expected to have supported performance. Labcorp has been making progress against its strategic priorities, including strengthening its specialty testing capabilities across oncology, neurology, autoimmune disease and women's health. Partnerships with health systems and regional and local laboratories are likely to support results by expanding access to Labcorp’s laboratory services, scientific expertise and broad testing portfolio, including specialty diagnostics.
Another close peer, Thermo Fisher (TMO - Free Report) , is slated to report its 2026 third-quarter results before the market opens on Oct. 21. Strength across the pharma and biotech end markets is expected to have supported performance, driven by bioproduction and clinical research businesses, as well as the research and safety market channel. Thermo Fisher’s strong cadence of high-impact innovations may have been a major boost to its revenues. Recent acquisitions, including Clario and Solventum’s filtration and separation business, are likely to support results as well.
ABT’s Price Performance & ValuationDuring third-quarter 2026, Abbott shares have risen 7.2% compared with a 0.7% gain for the industry.
Image Source: Zacks Investment Research
In terms of valuation, Abbott currently trades at a forward five-year Price/Earnings (P/E) of 16.71X, representing a slight premium to the industry average of 15.93X. However, the stock trades at a steep discount to its five-year median of 23.03X.
Image Source: Zacks Investment Research
EndnoteAbbott’s upcoming third-quarter results may reflect contributions from its diversified businesses, including Core Laboratory diagnostics, EPD products and Diabetes Care. Cancer Diagnostics sales may have benefited from increased Cologuard use, growth in precision oncology and continued international adoption. Improving demand and ongoing product innovation are likely to have supported the Nutrition business. In terms of share performance, Abbott outpaced the industry in the July-September quarter. The consensus outlook also points to year-over-year growth in earnings and revenues. With its current valuation below its historical average, ABT stock may offer an attractive entry point for prospective investors.
Thermo Fisher má ve třetím čtvrtletí roku 2026 vykázat tržby ve výši 11,91 miliardy USD, což představuje meziroční růst o 7,1 %, a EPS ve výši 6,40 USD, meziročně vyšší o 10,5 %.
Key Takeaways Thermo Fisher's Q3 revenues are projected to rise 7.1% to $11.91B, with EPS up 10.5% to $6.40. Life Sciences Solutions and Laboratory Products revenues are expected to grow 10.1% and 9.8%, respectively. TMO's product innovations may boost Q3 sales, while Specialty Diagnostics revenues are expected to fall 3%. Thermo Fisher Scientific (TMO - Free Report) is set to release third-quarter 2026 results on Oct. 21, before the market opens.
In the last reported quarter, the company posted adjusted earnings per share (EPS) of $6.03, which surpassed the Zacks Consensus Estimate by 5.60%. The company’s earnings topped estimates in each of the trailing four quarters, the average surprise being 4.42%.
Q3 Estimates for TMOThe Zacks Consensus Estimate for revenues is pegged at $11.91 billion, indicating an increase of 7.1% from the year-ago reported figure.
The consensus mark for the company’s EPS implies a 10.5% year-over-year rise to $6.40. The estimate has remained unchanged in the past 30 days.
Factors Likely to Influence TMO’s Q3 ResultsLife Sciences SolutionsThe segment’s performance is expected to have benefited from continued strength in the Bioproduction business.
A steady cadence of product launches is also expected to have supported the Life Sciences Solutions segment. Among its newer innovations, Thermo Fisher introduced the Gibco CHO-K1 Catalog Panel, a cGMP-ready portfolio of basal and feed media designed to support strong cell growth and protein production across CHO-K1 cell lines.
The company also launched the Multiskan Ease Absorbance Microplate Reader to support protein quantification, enzyme-linked immunosorbent assays (ELISAs), cell viability studies, microbial growth monitoring and other routine laboratory applications with simplified operation and dependable performance. Thermo Fisher’s new Applied Biosystems PowerFlex Thermal Cycler is designed to help deliver enhanced flexibility, precise thermal performance and improved productivity for modern molecular biology laboratories. We expect all these developments to have positively boosted revenues in the third quarter of 2026.
Per the Zacks Consensus Estimate, the Life Sciences Solutions revenues are expected to increase 10.1% year over year.
Analytical InstrumentsThe segment is likely to have witnessed growth across all three businesses, led by the electron microscopy business in third-quarter 2026.
Also, Thermo Fisher’s strength in innovations may have remained a bright spot. The company introduced the EMPAD G2 detector to help researchers capture more information about materials in a single scan, recording both the strongest and weakest signals without sacrificing imaging speed or data quality.
TMO also introduced Orbitrap Isora Mass Spectrometer and Orbitrap Isora Pro Mass Spectrometer, the company’s first Orbitrap instruments with a dedicated isotope ratio analysis mode. In the previous quarter, Thermo Fisher collaborated with NVIDIA, which is expected to have made further progress toward commercializing AI-enabled scientific workflow solutions. These developments might have favorably boosted the company’s top line in the third quarter.
Per the Zacks Consensus Estimate, revenues in this segment are projected to increase 2.6% year over year.
Specialty DiagnosticsSimilar to the previous quarter, the segment’s growth may have been driven by the immunodiagnostics and transplant diagnostics businesses. The healthcare market channel likely contributed to third-quarter revenues.
Recent product innovations are also expected to have supported the segment's performance. These include InstaFlux, an integrated media-on-demand enrichment workflow that helps food microbiology laboratories simplify media preparation, improve productivity and enhance sample traceability, as well as Thermo Scientific Brilliance Candida 2 Agar and Spectra Candida Agar, new color-based (chromogenic) culture media to quickly detect and differentiate clinically important Candida species.
Thermo Fisher Scientific Inc. Price and EPS SurpriseThermo Fisher marked a notable development in August 2026, completing the sale of its microbiology business to Astorg for approximately $1.075 billion.
The Zacks Consensus Estimate for Specialty Diagnostics revenues implies a decline of 3% year over year.
Laboratory Products and Biopharma ServicesIn the third quarter of 2026, the segment is likely to have delivered solid performance due to its clinical research business and the research and safety market channel.
Thermo Fisher launched the PPD CorEvitas Vitiligo Registry, a prospective, observational clinical registry designed to generate longitudinal real-world evidence in adolescents and adults living with nonsegmental vitiligo (NSV). During the previous quarter, Thermo Fisher’s PPD clinical research business expanded its global bioanalytical capabilities by opening a new bioanalytical and biomarker laboratory in Gothenburg, Sweden. Collectively, these developments are expected to have supported the segment's third-quarter revenues.
The Zacks Consensus Estimate for revenues indicates an increase of 9.8% year over year.
What Our Model Unveils for TMOPer our proven model, a stock with a Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy), 2 (Buy) or 3 (Hold), along with a positive Earnings ESP, has a higher chance of beating estimates, which is not the case here, as you can see below.
Earnings ESP: Thermo Fisher has an Earnings ESP of 0.00%. You can uncover the best stocks to buy or sell before they’re reported with our Earnings ESP Filter.
Zacks Rank: The company currently carries a Zacks Rank #2.
You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank stocks here.
MedTech PicksHere are some medical stocks worth considering, as these have the right combination of elements to post an earnings beat this time around:
TG Therapeutics (TGTX - Free Report) has an Earnings ESP of +71.43% and a Zacks Rank #1 at present. The company is expected to release third-quarter 2026 results soon.
TGTX’s earnings beat estimates in one of the trailing four quarters and missed on the remaining three occasions, the average surprise being 184.65%. The Zacks Consensus Estimate for third-quarter EPS implies a decrease of 84.8% from the year-ago quarter’s figure.
Revvity (RVTY - Free Report) has an Earnings ESP of +1.03% and a Zacks Rank #2 at present. The company is slated to release third-quarter 2026 results on Nov. 3.
RVTY’s earnings surpassed estimates in each of the trailing four quarters, the average surprise being 6.59%. The Zacks Consensus Estimate for third-quarter EPS indicates an increase of 9.3% from the year-ago quarter’s figure.
HeartSciences (HSCS - Free Report) has an Earnings ESP of +2.70% and a Zacks Rank #2 at present. The company is expected to release second-quarter fiscal 2027 results soon.
HSCS’ earnings surpassed estimates in two of the trailing four quarters and missed in the other two, the average negative surprise being 0.06%. The Zacks Consensus Estimate for fiscal second-quarter loss per share calls for an improvement of 12.9% from the year-ago quarter’s figure.
Experimentální lék retatrutid od Eli Lilly vedl ve studii fáze 3 k průměrnému úbytku hmotnosti o 22,6 % za 80 týdnů; firma plánuje podat žádost o schválení FDA v prvním čtvrtletí roku 2027.
Eli Lilly (LLY -0.65%) will report third-quarter earnings on Oct. 29, with the market paying particularly close attention to sales of its blockbuster diabetes and obesity drugs Mounjaro and Zepbound. But the company's experimental obesity treatment, retatrutide, could have a much greater influence on its long-term growth.
If you're unfamiliar, retatrutide is a once-weekly injection that targets three hormone receptors involved in regulating appetite, blood sugar, and metabolism. By comparison, Zepbound targets two. And thus far, clinical results have been impressive.
Image source: Getty Images.
Results matter
In July, Lilly announced that retatrutide achieved average weight loss of 22.6% over 80 weeks in a Phase 3 trial involving patients with obesity and established cardiovascular disease. Another Phase 3 study involving overweight or obese patients and type 2 diabetes produced average weight loss of up to 20.8%. Earlier Phase 3 research showed that patients without diabetes who received the highest dose of retatrutide lost an average of 28.3% of their body weight over 80 weeks. That said, the latest results also raised some questions.
Although retatrutide improved several cardiovascular risk factors, including blood pressure and cholesterol, its Phase 3 TRIUMPH-3 study didn't establish whether the drug reduces the risk of major cardiovascular events. That leaves Lilly with more work to do in demonstrating benefits beyond weight loss. Still, retatrutide could eventually complement Zepbound rather than simply replace it, giving physicians another treatment option for patients who need greater weight reduction.
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Lilly plans to submit retatrutide for FDA approval in the first quarter of 2027. Meanwhile, its existing obesity treatment business continues growing rapidly. Second-quarter revenue reached $22.97 billion, up 48% year over year, driven largely by demand for Mounjaro and Zepbound. Those sales will likely dominate the Oct. 29 earnings discussion.
But retatrutide's regulatory progress, eventual commercial launch, and ability to demonstrate additional health benefits could play a much larger role in determining where Lilly's business stands several years from now. In other words, don't lose sight of the long-term horizon for this company.
Jeff Siegel has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends Eli Lilly. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.
NorthCrest Asset Manangement LLC grew its holdings in Medtronic PLC (NYSE:MDT – Free Report) by 14.2% in the third quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the SEC. The institutional investor owned 105,147 shares of the medical technology company’s stock after buying an additional 13,074 shares during the quarter. NorthCrest Asset Manangement LLC’s holdings in Medtronic were worth $9,227,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.
A number of other institutional investors have also made changes to their positions in MDT. WCM Investment Management LLC acquired a new stake in Medtronic during the 1st quarter worth $965,922,000. First Eagle Investment Management LLC grew its stake in Medtronic by 37.2% in the second quarter. First Eagle Investment Management LLC now owns 13,783,983 shares of the medical technology company’s stock valued at $1,078,321,000 after acquiring an additional 3,739,288 shares during the period. Cullen Capital Management LLC acquired a new position in Medtronic in the second quarter valued at about $202,764,000. State Street Corp increased its holdings in shares of Medtronic by 2.7% in the second quarter. State Street Corp now owns 63,399,315 shares of the medical technology company’s stock worth $5,005,320,000 after acquiring an additional 1,658,301 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Amundi increased its holdings in shares of Medtronic by 36.3% in the first quarter. Amundi now owns 6,070,236 shares of the medical technology company’s stock worth $525,986,000 after acquiring an additional 1,616,739 shares in the last quarter. 82.06% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.
Wall Street Analyst Weigh In A number of equities research analysts have recently commented on MDT shares. Truist Financial reaffirmed a “hold” rating and set a $99.00 price target (up from $86.00) on shares of Medtronic in a research report on Wednesday, September 2nd. UBS Group boosted their price objective on Medtronic from $100.00 to $110.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Thursday, September 3rd. Stifel Nicolaus increased their target price on Medtronic from $80.00 to $95.00 and gave the stock a “hold” rating in a research note on Wednesday, September 2nd. Piper Sandler restated a “neutral” rating on shares of Medtronic in a report on Monday, August 10th. Finally, Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft restated a “hold” rating and set a $92.00 target price on shares of Medtronic in a report on Thursday, September 3rd. Eighteen research analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and ten have given a Hold rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the company presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $102.88.
Get Our Latest Report on MDT Insider Buying and Selling at Medtronic In other news, EVP Harry Kiil sold 1,483 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, September 16th. The shares were sold at an average price of $93.65, for a total transaction of $138,882.95. Following the completion of the transaction, the executive vice president directly owned 42,186 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $3,950,718.90. This trade represents a 3.40% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through the SEC website. 0.27% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.
More Medtronic News Here are the key news stories impacting Medtronic this week:
Positive Sentiment: Medtronic said its MiniMed exchange offer was oversubscribed and that it will exchange all of its remaining 252.8 million MiniMed shares. The transaction simplifies Medtronic’s portfolio and allows the company to focus more directly on its core medical-device operations. Medtronic Announces Preliminary Results of MiniMed Group Exchange Offer Positive Sentiment: The MiniMed offer had an 18.3% proration rate, indicating substantial investor demand to participate in the exchange. The result provides further clarity on the ownership transition and separation. Medtronic Reports 18.3 Percent MiniMed Proration Positive Sentiment: BTIG Research maintained a Buy rating while trimming its price target modestly to $99 from $100, still implying meaningful upside from the stock’s recent level. Medtronic Price Target Cut by BTIG Research Positive Sentiment: A new industry report projects the global bioelectronic-medicine device market to expand at approximately a 17% annual rate through 2030. Medtronic’s participation in neuromodulation and closed-loop technologies could provide a favorable long-term demand backdrop, although the report is not company-specific. Global Bioelectronic Medicine Device Market Report Neutral Sentiment: Medtronic’s valuation and improving growth outlook are attracting attention after a period of underperformance versus the broader market. The investment case depends on whether operational improvements can produce more consistent growth. Negative Sentiment: Short interest in Medtronic increased, signaling that more investors are betting against the shares and potentially creating future selling pressure. Medtronic Sees Increase in Short Interest Medtronic Stock Up 3.5% MDT stock opened at $91.61 on Tuesday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.50, a current ratio of 2.07 and a quick ratio of 1.54. The stock has a market capitalization of $117.18 billion, a P/E ratio of 22.56, a P/E/G ratio of 2.02 and a beta of 0.55. The business has a 50-day moving average of $90.38 and a 200-day moving average of $84.80. Medtronic PLC has a fifty-two week low of $73.31 and a fifty-two week high of $106.33.
Medtronic (NYSE:MDT – Get Free Report) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, September 1st. The medical technology company reported $1.45 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.39 by $0.06. Medtronic had a return on equity of 14.78% and a net margin of 13.93%. The business had revenue of $9.76 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $9.55 billion. During the same period last year, the company earned $1.26 earnings per share. Medtronic’s quarterly revenue was up 13.7% on a year-over-year basis. Medtronic has set its Q2 2027 guidance at 1.320-1.340 EPS and its FY 2027 guidance at 5.940-6.000 EPS. On average, sell-side analysts anticipate that Medtronic PLC will post 5.98 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.
Medtronic Dividend Announcement The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, October 16th. Stockholders of record on Friday, September 25th will be paid a dividend of $0.72 per share. This represents a $2.88 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 3.1%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, September 25th. Medtronic’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is currently 70.94%.
Medtronic Company Profile (Free Report)
Medtronic plc is a global medical technology company that develops and manufactures devices, therapies and healthcare solutions for treating chronic and acute conditions. Its products are used in areas including cardiac and vascular care, neuroscience, medical and surgical procedures, and diabetes management.
The company’s portfolio includes pacemakers, implantable cardioverter-defibrillators, cardiac ablation systems, stents and other cardiovascular products; neuromodulation systems, deep-brain stimulation devices and spinal technologies; surgical instruments, robotic-assisted surgery systems and gastrointestinal diagnostic tools; and insulin pumps and related diabetes technologies.
Medtronic traces its origins to 1949, when Earl Bakken and Palmer Hermundslie founded the company in Minneapolis, Minnesota.
Featured Stories Five stocks we like better than Medtronic Salesforce Just Got a Rare Double Upgrade—What Changed? OpenAI’s Revenue Scare Could Be a Big Opportunity for Investors China Still Dominates Rare Earths—These 3 U.S. Companies Could Benefit 3 REITs That May Win in a Higher Interest Rate Environment
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Morgan Stanley před zveřejněním výsledků čelí ochlazení trhu M&A; analytici za 3. čtvrtletí očekávají růst tržeb o 10 % na 20,1 mld. USD a EPS ve výši 2,92 USD.
Buy MS. The selloff is driven by M&A/IPO cooling, but earnings are the near-term catalyst and the options market is pricing only moderate volatility. With MS still above its ascending trendline and the 50-week moving average, a rebound is the base case. Upside path: reclaim ~$200 first, then push toward ~$220 if results beat and guidance doesn’t confirm a deeper banking slowdown.
Key Risk: Earnings/guidance show a sharper investment-banking collapse than expected, breaking the ascending trendline and turning the rebound into a fresh downtrend.
MS 205 Calls
Buy MS 205 call exposure (or a call spread centered around 205). Options positioning is call-heavy and the market is targeting ~$205, suggesting upside skew into the print. If MS stabilizes/rebounds on earnings, calls should outperform stock because implied volatility is already elevated versus history and the move can trigger a fast repricing.
Key Risk: MS misses or guides lower enough that the stock trades below ~$200, causing call premium to decay quickly despite any volatility.
Morgan Stanley stock has slipped substantially in the past few weeks as enthusiasm about mergers and acquisitions (M&A) and IPOs cooled. MS initially jumped to $230 in July and then tumbled to a low of $182.62. Focus now shifts to its upcoming earnings, with the options market pointing to moderate volatility.
Morgan Stanley stock has come under pressure in the past few weeks as recent data shows that mergers and acquisitions activity has cooled. A recent report showed that global M&A activity totalled $993 billion in the third quarter, down 41% compared to the second quarter. It marked the first quarter that the figure dropped below $1 trillion since the second quarter of last year.
Morgan Stanley is highly exposed to the M&A business because it is one of the biggest names in the industry. Dealogic data shows that it has advised deals worth over $1.084 trillion this year, up from $892 billion in the same period last year. It ranks as the third-largest bank after Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan.
Morgan Stanley also ranks as the third-biggest bank in equity capital markets after Goldman and JPMorgan. Its ECM value has jumped to $73.2 billion from $58 billion last year. In total, Dealogic estimates that its investment banking revenue stands at over $5.88 billion from $4.7 billion.
READ MORE: Morgan Stanley: look for opportunities in these two markets
The next important catalyst for Morgan Stanley stock is the upcoming earnings announcement, which will provide more color about its business. Yahoo Finance data shows that the average estimate is that its third-quarter revenue rose by 10% to $20.1 billion, with the earnings-per-share (EPS) rising from $2.8 to $2.92. The company often beats estimates, and this trend may continue.
The last earnings report showed that Morgan Stanley’s institutional securities revenue rose to $11.04 billion in Q2 from $7.6 billion in the same period last year. Its wealth management revenue rose from $7.7 billion to $8.8 billion, while the smaller investment management segment made $1.6 billion.
The options market expects moderate volatility when it publishes its financial results. Data shows that it has an implied volatility of 51%, up from its historical average of $20. Most of the calls are concentrated at $205, up by about 8% from the current level. It has a put/call ratio of less than 0.50, a sign that there are more calls than puts.
MS stock chart | Source: TradingView
The weekly chart shows that the MS stock has retreated in the past few weeks. It dropped in the last six consecutive weeks as investors brace for weak earnings. On the positive side, it has remained above the ascending trendline that links the lowest levels in April last year, March this year, and September. It also coincided with the 50-week moving average.
Therefore, there is a likelihood that the stock will rebound after earnings. If this happens, the next initial target to watch will be at $200. A move above that level will point to more gains towards $220. A move below the ascending trendline will invalidate the bullish outlook.
ServiceNow's AI business just crossed a milestone that has analysts arguing over whether the stock's recent selloff is a gift or a warning sign. The answer depends on one number management has promised to hit before year-end.
ServiceNow (NYSE:NOW | NOW Price Prediction) trades at $139.75. The 24/7 Wall St. price target of $247.40 implies 77.03% upside over the next 12 months, and our model rates the stock a buy.
24/7 Wall St. Price Target Summary Metric Value Current Price $139.75 24/7 Wall St. Price Target $247.40 Upside/Downside 77.03% Recommendation BUY Confidence Level 90% The model has high confidence in this call. It rests on AI. In Q2, annual contract value (ACV) from ServiceNow AI passed $1B, and management said it is “on track to beat our target of one and a half billion ACV by the end of 2026.”
That engine sits on top of subscription revenue growing 24.5% per year. The share price has fell behind those results.
Shares Are Climbing Back After a Brutal Year ServiceNow is up 2.4% over the past week and 5.11% over the past month. It is still down 7.91% year to date and 22.86% over 12 months. It trades about 24% below its 52-week high of $192.97 and well above its low of $81.24.
Q2 revenue rose 24% to $3.987B. Non-GAAP EPS came in at $0.90, ahead of the $0.86 estimate. Current remaining performance obligations (cRPO), which track contracted revenue due over the next 12 months, rose 21% to $13.20B. Management also raised full-year subscription guidance to $15.76-$15.78B.
Why Bulls See $274 Within Reach Agentic AI customer adoption rose 9x over the last nine months, with AI ACV growing over 40% quarter over quarter. ServiceNow’s Level 1 support agents close 80 to 85% of service requests without human help.
The Armis and Veza acquisitions add security and identity products to a cybersecurity business management called “billion-dollar-plus.” The long-term goal is $30B+ subscription revenue by 2030. Analysts are firmly bullish, with 10 Strong Buy and 35 Buy ratings. Our bull case reaches $274.21.
GAAP Profits Are the Risk to Keep an Eye On GAAP operating income fell 54.75% to $162M, and GAAP subscription gross margin slipped to 73.5% from 80%. Part of Q2’s strength came from federal revenue pulled forward from Q3, with guidance pointing to slower growth of +20.5% next quarter.
The pressure comes from amortization and stock-based pay linked to the Moveworks, Veza and Armis deals. Free cash flow still grew 20.53%. The bear case still lands at $195.11.
Is ServiceNow Pricier Than Salesforce, Workday and Palantir? Company Forward P/E Quarterly Revenue Growth YoY ServiceNow 28x 24% Salesforce 14x 10.8% Workday 18x 12.8% Palantir 85x 92.8% Salesforce (NYSE:CRM) competes directly with ServiceNow’s 2 billion ACV CRM business at half the multiple but less than half the growth.
Workday (NASDAQ:WDAY) competes for HR workflow budgets at roughly half ServiceNow’s growth rate.
Palantir (NASDAQ:PLTR) trades at 85x forward earnings as the premium enterprise-AI benchmark. ServiceNow sits between these names: costlier than slower-growing application peers and far less than the AI leader, making our target reasonable.
ServiceNow Price Prediction 2026-2030 The 24/7 Wall St. price target of $247.40 carries a buy rating at 90% confidence. The deciding factor is AI growth coupled with a modest forward multiple.
Conviction would grow if AI ACV tops $1.5 billion by year-end. Caution would rise if cRPO growth slows significantly below guidance. Right now, fundamentals point higher.
Our model projects the stock could trade at these levels if current growth trends and market conditions hold.
Year 24/7 Wall St. Price Target 2026 $144.16 2027 $242.85 2028 $368.90 2029 $478.47 2030 $581.16 ServiceNow’s ability to perform its AI and security strategy supports these projections. Faster AI rollout could add upside. Weaker federal spending or ongoing GAAP margin pressure could pull results lower.
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Key Takeaways Intuit's Mailchimp revenues fell 1% to $1.3 billion in fiscal 2026, with growth expected to remain weak.Mailchimp's operating margin expanded 4.9 percentage points to 47.5%, while operating income rose 10%.INTU focuses on retention, value-based pricing and cross-selling, with separate FY27 reporting for Mailchimp. Intuit (INTU - Free Report) is working to stabilize Mailchimp amid weak revenue growth and rising customer churn. Mailchimp’s fiscal 2026 revenues declined 1% year over year to $1.3 billion, contrasting with Intuit’s overall revenue growth of 14%. The outlook remains challenging, with management expecting Mailchimp’s fiscal 2027 revenues to range between $1.256 billion and $1.266 billion, indicating a decline of 1% to flat growth.
Despite these challenges, Mailchimp is making progress on profitability. Its fiscal 2026 operating margin expanded 4.9 percentage points to 47.5%, while operating income increased 10% to $604 million. These improvements reflect better cost discipline, although sustained profitability gains alone may not be enough to revive revenue growth.
High-value, sales-assisted mid-market bookings’ monthly recurring revenues grew 9% year over year in fiscal 2026. Paid SMS customers increased 35%, while average spending among SMS customers was 11% higher. Active high-value customer dollar churn also improved 1% year over year, suggesting progress in retaining valuable customers.
Intuit is strengthening accountability by managing Mailchimp as a separate operating segment from August 2026, with independent reporting beginning in fiscal 2027. Management is prioritizing customer retention, value-based pricing, cross-selling and disciplined spending to improve monetization and profitability. However, higher effective prices are expected to offset increased customer churn, highlighting the challenges facing its growth strategy.
Margin expansion, SMS adoption and improving high-value customer retention provide encouraging signs, but the near-term revenue outlook remains subdued for Mailchimp. Sustained customer retention and stronger bookings conversion will be essential for Mailchimp to return to meaningful growth and contribute more significantly to Intuit’s performance.
How Are INTU’s Competitors Faring?Klaviyo (KVYO - Free Report) provides AI-powered marketing automation and customer relationship management solutions, helping businesses deliver personalized customer experiences through email, SMS and other digital channels. In the second quarter of 2026, revenues increased 26% year over year to $370.6 million. The company raised its full-year revenue guidance to $1.526-$1.534 billion.
Braze (BRZE - Free Report) offers a customer engagement platform that enables businesses to deliver personalized, cross-channel marketing campaigns through mobile apps, email and other digital channels. In the second quarter of fiscal 2027, revenues grew 26.2% year over year to $227.2 million, supported by new customer additions, upselling and renewals.
INTU’s Price Performance, Valuation and EstimatesShares of Intuit have gained 8.3% over the past three months, underperforming the broader industry but outperforming the S&P 500 composite.
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In terms of forward 12-month Price/Sales (P/S), Intuit is currently trading at 3.43X, which is at a discount to the industry average of 6.43X.
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Intuit’s estimate revisions reflect a negative trend. The Zacks Consensus Estimate for fiscal 2027 EPS has been revised downward 15.8% to $23.49 over the past two months. The consensus estimate for 2027 calls for negative 3.2% growth year over year.
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Currently, Intuit carries a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold). You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here.
