Apple is reportedly teaming up with deferred payment processor Klarna to launch a new lease-to-own program for its devices.
Bloomberg reported Tuesday that the program — dubbed Apple Upgrade — is set to launch next Tuesday, July 28. It will allow consumers to pay for their purchases over multi-year periods, including iPhones, iPads, Macs, and Apple Watches.
Bloomberg writes that the lease term for iPhones and Apple Watches will be up to 24 months, while leases for Macs and iPads will be up to 36 months. The devices can either be kept or returned at the end of the leasing period, while upgrades to new devices will also be available (hence the name of the program). The report notes vaguely that, in some cases, “transactions will incur an additional fee.”
Apple already has a similar program called iPhone Upgrade, although the company plans to stop allowing new customer sign-ups to instead build out the broader, more inclusive Apple Upgrade program, the report said.
A leasing program is an obvious strategy for Apple at this point. The iPhone maker has been battling supply chain issues wrought by “RAMageddon” — the industry-wide shortage of memory chips that is driving up the price of hardware. Those shortages have been driven largely by the AI industry, which is gobbling up so much memory that it’s not leaving much for the rest of us.
To deal with these issues, Apple recently announced that it would be raising prices, and Upgrade clearly seems designed to make those hiked prices more palatable to consumers.
TechCrunch reached out to Apple and Klarna for more information.
Overall, the new program seems like a shrewd move for Apple, which is currently facing a hectic transitional period. As new CEO John Ternus takes the reins, the company also entered into a legal battle with AI startup superstar OpenAI — suing the company for alleged trade theft.
In short: The company has its hands full, and anything that can shore up sales and keep the business headed in the right direction is worth trying.
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Lucas is a senior writer at TechCrunch, where he covers artificial intelligence, consumer tech, and startups. He previously covered AI and cybersecurity at Gizmodo. You can contact Lucas by emailing [email protected].
Tesla Inc (NASDAQ:TSLA) said it will roll out a new software update this summer that lets its Grok AI assistant make phone calls, play music, adjust cabin climate and open the glovebox by voice command.
The update also allows drivers to view and share self-driving statistics through Tesla's mobile app, and gives Navigation the ability to suggest routine destinations and prioritize routes drivers have previously taken.
Other features include the ability to set a desired arrival battery level from the app, upload custom vehicle wraps without a USB drive, and lock rear display controls from the front screen. Tesla's in-car Caraoke feature will add scoring and saved high scores.
The company also plans to add Supercharger name search, queue controls for Apple Music, adjustable zoom for the self-driving visualization display, browser camera and microphone support, and new animations for the Model 3 and Model Y.
Image Credits:Tim Goessman / Bloomberg / Getty Images Tesla has brought an unspecified number of its unsupervised Model Y SUVs to Orlando and Tampa, just one day ahead of the company’s scheduled second-quarter earnings call. That marks the third city in Florida where Tesla is trialing its nascent robotaxi service, following a small launch in Miami a few weeks ago.
The two new cities appear to have fairly small operational areas, and Tesla did not offer any further details about the launch. As some fans have noticed, Tesla announced autonomous fleets in Dallas and Houston before its first-quarter earnings release but has yet to scale those operations. The company disbanded its press office years ago.
Tesla has taken a far slower approach to standing up a commercial robotaxi service than it has promised investors. CEO Elon Musk, for instance, said repeatedly that Tesla’s robotaxis would serve half the U.S. population by the end of 2025.
Musk offered more metered comments earlier this year on Tesla’s first-quarter call. But the company may get a big lift from the Trump administration, as last month the Department of Transportation proposed a rule change that would no longer require brake pedals be built into cars that are designed to be autonomous. If adopted, that could clear the way for Tesla to try and deploy the dozens of two-seater Cybercabs that it has been staging in cities across the country.
Tesla TSLA shares are inching higher ahead of the company’s second-quarter earnings scheduled to be released after market close on Wednesday, July 22nd.
Consensus is for the EV specialist to post a nearly 15% year-on-year increase in earnings per share (EPS) to $0.31 on revenue of at least $25.7 billion – which would represent a 16% jump from last year.
While Tesla stock remains down significantly versus the start of 2026, options pricing suggests it’s poised to reclaim some of that loss after the Q2 print this week.
Heading into Tesla’s quarterly earnings, the put-to-call ratio on options contracts expiring July 24th sits at 0.54, indicating a strong bullish skew.
According to Barchart, the upper price on those contracts sits at just over $401 currently, signaling potential for a 5.36% rally in TSLA shares through the end of this week.
Much of the derivatives market’s confidence may be traced back to Tesla’s strong delivery report.
Earlier this month, billionaire Elon Musk’s company said it delivered 480,126 vehicles in its fiscal Q2, up 25% versus the same quarter of 2025.
Analysts at Cantor Fitzgerald seem to agree with options traders on Tesla shares.
In a note to clients this week, they maintained an Overweight rating on the EV firm and a strongly bullish $510 price target.
Their positive view is rooted in its high-margin Cybercab business.
“We believe TSLA will have the ability to scale rapidly following commercialization (despite the delayed expansion) and capture meaningful market share,” the firm’s analysts wrote.
Amidst accelerating milestones for the Optimus Gen 3 humanoid robots, Cantor Fitzgerald remains constructive on Tesla's ability to unlock recurring software economics as autonomy commercializes.
From a technical perspective, the EV stock is currently trading a little under its 20-day MA – with a decisive break above the $395 level expected to boost upward momentum in the near-term.
While top-line delivery growth provides a solid backdrop, Street’s post-earnings focus will quickly shift to automotive gross margins and capital spending efficiency.
Investors are eager to see if manufacturing scale, operational discipline, and localized supply chain efficiencies can offset pricing pressures and raw material cost headwinds, protecting operational profitability.
Beyond core auto metrics, management’s commentary on the earnings call regarding real-world AI investments – specifically concrete timelines for Full Self-Driving (FSD) expansion and scaling capital expenditure for data center compute – will likely act as a catalyst.
A decisive beat on core margins paired with confident guidance on physical AI infrastructure could give TSLA stock the momentum needed to clear technical resistance levels.
Heading into the earnings release, Wall Street remains bullish on Tesla Inc, with a “Moderate Buy” rating coupled with a $418 mean price target.
At $369.57, Tesla (NASDAQ:TSLA | TSLA Price Prediction) looks overvalued, because the multiple asks investors to underwrite three uninvented businesses while the core auto operation decelerates. With Q2 results imminent, the gap between narrative and accounting has rarely been wider.
Tesla still earns most of its money making electric vehicles, with a growing energy storage arm and fast-scaling services including Full Self-Driving subscriptions. The story running the stock, however, is Robotaxi, Optimus, and in-house AI silicon. Shares are down 17.82% year to date and sit below both the 50-day ($409.80) and 200-day ($417.05) moving averages, well off the 52-week high of $498.83.
Why the Margin Recovery Could Reignite the Story Q1 2026 delivered the operational turn bulls have been waiting for. EPS came in at $0.41 versus $0.3592 expected, revenue grew 15.78% year over year, and automotive gross margin snapped back to 21.1% from 16.2%. Services revenue jumped 42%, and FSD paid subscribers reached roughly 1.3 million, up 51% year over year.
The balance sheet remains a fortress at $44.7 billion in cash against modest debt, and prediction markets assign an 80% probability of another earnings beat on July 22. Management believes Optimus will be “the biggest product ever”, and if even a fraction of that optionality clears, today’s price will look cheap.
Why the Accounting Refuses to Justify the Multiple Strip out the speculative narratives and the fundamentals are those of an increasingly commoditized auto manufacturer. FY2025 net income fell 46.79%, Q4 deliveries dropped 16% to 418,227 units, and regulatory credits keep shrinking. Operating expenses grew 37% year over year in Q1 on AI spend and CEO stock-based comp.
Valuation sits at 346 trailing P/E and 167 forward P/E, with a PEG of 5 and EV/EBITDA of 116. Prediction markets price Optimus release by year-end at just 16%, California robotaxi at 18.5%, and Robovan orders at 7%. CFO Vaibhav Taneja guided to over $25 billion of CapEx and negative free cash flow for the rest of the year.
Why Patience Might Beat Conviction Either Way The Hold argument rests on catalyst density. Q2 deliveries returned to growth, an EU FSD expansion is progressing, and AI5 tape-out cleared in April. Analyst consensus splits 23 Buy/Strong Buy, 18 Hold, and 6 Sell/Strong Sell across 47 shops, defining an unresolved debate.
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Musk conceded Optimus production this year is “impossible to predict” and Robotaxi revenue will not be “super material this year”. Waiting one or two prints for hard Optimus unit economics, Robotaxi safety data, and clarity on AI CapEx payback lets investors avoid paying peak narrative premium ahead of proof.
What the Tape and the Street Actually Say Shares currently trade near $369.57 against an average analyst price target of $425.22, implying roughly 15% upside from a pool of 47 analysts. Targets are one data point among many.
Year to date, TSLA is down 17.82% while the S&P 500 is up 8.82%. Over one year, TSLA is up 12.11% versus 18.25% for the index. Prediction markets give the stock only a 48% chance of closing July above $370.
Why $370 Looks Stretched At $370, Tesla is a Sell.
The path to further downside is straightforward. Consensus already models roughly $27.6 billion in Q2 revenue and $1.27 billion in net income, and CapEx guidance points to negative free cash flow into 2027. If Q2 confirms an earnings beat but defers Optimus unit economics and California robotaxi timing, the multiple has room to compress toward the forward P/E of 167, still egregious but painful from here.
Likely triggers over the next two quarters are further regulatory credit erosion, a fifth consecutive quarter of operating expense growth above 30%, and continued inventory build from the current 27 days of supply. A hard Optimus production milestone, an approved California robotaxi permit, or genuine FSD margin disclosure would invalidate the thesis.
The core problem is that owners at $370 are paying an enterprise software multiple for a business currently generating auto-manufacturer margins, and Musk himself will not commit to when that changes. At current levels, the risk/reward skews unfavorably.
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Options traders are betting Tesla could see its biggest post-earnings move in a year when the electric auto giant reports on Wednesday after the bell.
Current prices for at-the-money puts and calls are implying a 5.76% move, which is the largest implied move since traders priced in a 6% swing back in October 2025. It would be the largest realized move since last July. On Tuesday, options flow leaned bullish, with traders having bought 244,000 calls compared to 116,000 puts through midday, while calls accounted for more than two-thirds of total premium traded.
The top three most active contracts by volume in Tesla were calls, with the most premium being spent by traders in the 380-calls expiring Friday. Traders spent more than $15 million on those nearly at-the-money calls, which commanded around $11 per contract, meaning they would require a 3% move higher by the end of the week to become profitable.
While options traders are expecting a large move, Tesla's stock has historically experienced muted moves on earnings days. In fact, over the past four quarters, the stock has experienced a median move of just 3.5%, according to CBOE data.
Also, on the radar for Musk-centric traders will be SpaceX's first earnings report since last month's initial public offering. That potential wildcard for the market will occur on Aug. 4. The options market is currently implying a 12% move in either direction.
"If you want to be aggressive you could argue [Tesla is] hanging on support and take the long side, which I am longer term, but it's more or less been rangebound since the start of the year," Gianni Di Poce, instructor at TheoTrade, said by phone. "The whole SpaceX thing is weighing on it, people are trying to figure out which to own and if they're going to merge."
Following its historic June IPO, SpaceX shares raced toward a $2 trillion valuation. But the stock has since fallen sharply, and the company's valuation now stands just under $1.7 trillion, just ahead of Tesla's $1.4 trillion.
Can Google make artificial intelligence cheaper to run?
• Alphabet stock is trading at elevated levels. What’s the outlook for GOOG shares?
That could make Alphabet’s earnings call about far more than revenue and earnings per share.
The AI Race Is Shifting To EfficiencyOver the past two years, investors have largely measured AI leadership by one metric: spending.
Frozen v2 hints at the next phase.
According to the report, Google engineers believe the new chip could deliver between six and 10 times more tokens per unit of power than the company’s latest Tensor Processing Units (TPUs) by embedding portions of Gemini’s architecture directly into the silicon.
If those projections hold, the implications extend well beyond Google’s chip business.
Running AI models — known as inference — is quickly becoming one of the largest operating expenses for hyperscalers as millions of users generate prompts every day. Improving efficiency could allow Google to serve more AI requests while consuming less power and fewer computing resources.
Why Investors Should Listen CloselyThat makes Alphabet’s earnings call an opportunity for management to discuss more than just AI investments.
Investors will be listening for any commentary on custom silicon, inference workloads, TPU deployment and capital spending. Even modest updates could provide clues about how Google plans to manage AI costs as Gemini adoption expands.
The report also comes as investors increasingly question whether hyperscalers can continue raising AI capital expenditures indefinitely. If Google can improve AI economics through better hardware rather than simply buying more compute, it could reshape how Wall Street evaluates future AI spending.
The Bigger Story Isn’t Another AI ChipAlphabet has built custom AI chips for years, making Frozen v2 less significant as a product announcement than as a strategic signal.
The next competitive advantage in AI may not come from training ever-larger models. It may come from making those models dramatically cheaper to operate.
That’s why this week’s earnings call matters.
Wall Street already knows Google is spending aggressively to compete in AI. What investors don’t yet know is whether the company has found a way to generate more AI output without proportionally increasing its infrastructure costs.
If Frozen v2 is part of that answer, Alphabet’s earnings could reveal that the next battle in AI isn’t just about building smarter models — it’s about building more efficient ones.
Image via Shutterstock
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Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL | GOOGL Price Prediction) looks compelling at $351.99, because the two-year Wall Street panic that conversational AI would cannibalize Google Search has been decisively invalidated by the numbers. For 24 months, the bear case rested on a single fear: that ChatGPT and its peers would siphon queries away from the world’s dominant ad engine. The most recent quarter shows the opposite happening in real time.
Alphabet is the parent of Google Search, YouTube, Google Cloud, Android, and Waymo. The stock has ripped 90.75% over the past year as investors reprocessed the AI threat as an AI tailwind. The question now is whether the current price already reflects that reappraisal, or whether more upside remains.
Why the AI Search Fear Just Died Q1 2026 demolished the bear thesis. Google Search & Other revenue hit $60.40 billion, up 19% year over year, with CEO Sundar Pichai confirming that “AI continues to drive search usage and queries are at an all-time high.”. Gemini-powered AI Overviews are expanding commercial ad inventory at higher click-through yields, Gemini-powered AI Overviews are expanding commercial ad inventory at higher click-through yields, with Hilton EMEA reportedly capturing one-third more clicks for one-fifth of the spend.
Google Cloud revenue grew 63% to $20.03 billion, operating margin expanded to 32.9% from 17.8%, and backlog nearly doubled quarter on quarter to over $460 billion. EPS came in at $5.11 versus $2.6327 estimated, a 94.1% beat, the fourth consecutive beat.
Why the Bears Still Have a Case Capex is the counterweight. Q1 capital expenditures more than doubled to $35.67 billion, free cash flow collapsed 46.63%, and management raised full-year 2026 capex guidance to $180 billion to $190 billion, with 2027 expected higher. Return on that infrastructure spend remains unproven quarter to quarter.
Antitrust overhang persists. Google Network revenue declined year over year, and Q1 net income was flattered by $36.91 billion in net unrealized gains on equity securities, introducing earnings volatility. Insider activity skews net selling across 181 recent insider transactions.
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Why Patience Might Still Win The Hold argument rests on entry timing. Shares are down 4.36% over the past month and sit 6% below the 52-week high of $408.37. With earnings due imminently and Polymarket assigning only a 59.5% probability of closing above $350 by month end, waiting for the print could offer a cleaner entry if capex commentary spooks the tape.
What the Numbers Actually Say Alphabet trades at $351.99 against a consensus analyst target of $433.51, implying 23.03% upside. Coverage is overwhelmingly positive with 14 Strong Buys, 43 Buys, 7 Holds, and zero Sell ratings. Valuation looks reasonable for the growth on offer: 26 trailing P/E, 25 forward P/E, with a PEG of 1.365. Year to date GOOGL is up 12.6%, while the SPDR S&P 500 ETF Trust (NYSEARCA:SPY) has gained roughly 3.3% since the Q1 filing, meaning the stock has lagged the broad market since its blowout report.
The Verdict at $350: Why the Buyers Win At $351.99, the setup for Alphabet looks favorable. Three simultaneous engines are all accelerating. Search at 19% growth invalidates the disruption narrative that suppressed the multiple for two years. Cloud at 63% growth with a $460 billion backlog gives Alphabet a second megacap growth business generating tripled operating income. Gemini, processing 16 billion tokens per minute via API, monetizes the same AI wave the market once feared.
A forward P/E of 25 for a business compounding revenue at 22% and expanding operating margins to 36.1% is a reasonable price for buyers. The thesis breaks only if capex returns disappoint by 2027 or an antitrust remedy structurally changes distribution. Both remain absent from the current trajectory.
Watch three things quarter by quarter: Cloud operating margin, Search query growth, and capex efficiency signals. If those hold, the analyst target north of $430 becomes the floor rather than the ceiling. The fear that defined Alphabet’s discount for two years is empirically dead, and the stock has not yet fully repriced.
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NEW YORK, July 21, 2026 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Pomerantz LLP is investigating claims on behalf of investors of Alphabet Inc. (“Alphabet” or the “Company”) (NASDAQ: GOOG). Such investors are advised to contact Danielle Peyton at [email protected] or 646-581-9980, ext. 7980.
The investigation concerns whether Alphabet and certain of its officers and/or directors have engaged in securities fraud or other unlawful business practices.
[Click here for information about joining the class action]
On July 16, 2026, Bloomberg reported that Alphabet’s Google is “months behind schedule on delivering Gemini 3.5 Pro , its most powerful flagship AI model” due to the Company's ongoing coding efforts. Specifically, the article reported that “[l]ate last month, Google updated the data being used to train Gemini in an attempt to improve [its] skills, but the results were disappointing.”
On this news, Alphabet’s stock price fell $16.40 per share, or 4.4%, to close at $353.81 per share on July 16, 2026.
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On Tuesday, Google DeepMind released Gemini 3.6 Flash, 3.5 Flash-Lite, and 3.5 Flash Cyber. Gemini 3.6 Flash is Google’s “workhorse model” that promises improved capabilities in coding, knowledge work, and multimodal performance while reducing token usage by up to 17%, making it cheaper than its predecessor 3.5 Flash.
Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite is the most cost-effective model in the class, and 3.5 Flash Cyber is a specialized model that was fine-tuned for finding and fixing cybersecurity vulnerabilities at a decent price point. This model will be exclusively available to governments and trusted partners as part of a limited access pilot program, according to Google.
Google says the focus on these releases is to deliver efficiency, latency, and reliability to customers that are building AI agents at scale.
The launch is notable not just for what Google shipped — cheaper, faster models optimized for coding, efficiency, and cybersecurity — but also for what it didn’t. The update doesn’t include the long-anticipated update to Google’s flagship model, Gemini Pro, which was last updated in February.
In the time since that launch, OpenAI has released GPT-5.5 and begun rolling out GPT-5.6, while Anthropic has launched Claude Opus 4.8 and Claude Sonnet 5 and has expanded access to its frontier Fable 5 model, highlighting the intense release pace of the rival labs.
Google teased the release of Pro as part of the 3.5 Flash release in May, saying the Pro version was “already being used internally, and we look forward to rolling it out next month.” Last week, Bloomberg reported that Google was facing internal delays in launching the 3.5 Pro as it struggled to meet internal performance goals.
Gemini Pro models are generally Google’s highest-capability offerings for complex reasoning and coding tasks, while Flash models prioritize lower cost and faster response times for production applications.
Google DeepMind product lead Logan Kilpatrick said Tuesday that the company is currently testing Gemini 3.5 Pro with partners and hopes to “land soon.” He also noted that the team has started its most ambitious pre-training run yet for Gemini 4.
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It is rolling out three new Gemini models as Google pushes to strengthen its AI lineup, lower usage costs and compete more directly in cybersecurity.
• What’s ahead for GOOG stock?
Google Targets CybersecurityGoogle is launching Gemini 3.5 Flash Cyber, a specialized model built to detect and patch software vulnerabilities.
The model will initially be available only to governments and trusted partners through a limited-access pilot. Google said it runs at a lower price per token than larger models, which could help the company compete more directly with Anthropic’s early lead in automated code defense.
Google is also releasing Gemini 3.6 Flash, which improves coding, multimodal and knowledge-work performance while using up to 17% fewer tokens than the previous model.
Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite is the fastest and lowest-cost model in the 3.5 family, designed for high-volume workloads and smaller tasks within larger AI-agent systems.
AI Race IntensifiesGoogle is also testing Gemini 3.5 Pro with partners and has started its largest-ever pre-training run for Gemini 4, offering more visibility into its AI roadmap after questions about product delays.
Technical AnalysisFrom a trend perspective, GOOG is still holding a longer-term uptrend (up 82.57% over the past 12 months), but the near-term tape is choppier: the stock is trading 1.1% below its 20-day SMA and 4.6% below its 50-day SMA, while staying 1.7% above the 100-day SMA and 8.4% above the 200-day SMA.
Earnings & Analyst OutlookThe countdown is on: Alphabet is set to report earnings on July 22 (confirmed).
EPS Estimate: $2.88 (Up from $2.31 year-over-year) Revenue Estimate: $113.63 billion (Up from $96.43 billion YoY) Valuation: P/E of 26.8x (Indicates premium valuation relative to peers) Analyst Consensus & Recent Actions: The stock carries a Buy rating with an average price forecast of $429.67. Recent analyst moves include:
TD Cowen: Buy (Raises forecast to $475 on June 9) Oppenheimer: Outperform (Raises forecast to $445 on May 15) JP Morgan: Overweight (Raises forecast to $460 on April 30) Top ETF ExposureSignificance: Because GOOG carries such a heavy weight in these funds, any significant inflows or outflows for these ETFs will likely trigger automatic buying or selling of the stock.
GOOG, GOOGL Price ActionPrice Action: Alphabet (GOOG) shares were down 0.89% at $348.23 and Alphabet (GOOGL) shares were down 0.83% at $349.08 at the time of publication on Tuesday, according to Benzinga Pro data.
Photo via Shutterstock
This content was partially produced with the help of AI tools and was reviewed and published by Benzinga editors.
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Alphabet Inc. GOOGL will report second-quarter earnings on Wednesday after the closing bell, with investors closely watching whether the Google parent can justify its growing investments in artificial intelligence amid delays to a key AI model and intensifying competition.
As the first of the "Magnificent Seven" technology companies to report earnings this season, Alphabet's results are expected to provide an early indication of demand for AI infrastructure and whether large capital investments are translating into business growth.
While the company's cloud business has remained a key growth driver, recent delays to its Gemini 3.5 Pro model have added to investor concerns about Alphabet's competitive position in the AI race.
According to LSEG data, Alphabet is expected to report second-quarter revenue of $116.93 billion, representing year-over-year growth of 21.3%.
Cloud revenue is expected to maintain growth of about 64%, while advertising revenue is forecast to increase 13.7%.
Benzinga Pro estimates second-quarter revenue at $113.6 billion and earnings per share of $2.87, compared with revenue of $96.4 billion and EPS of $2.31 in the same period last year.
Analysts also expect Google Cloud revenue to continue expanding rapidly, with Zacks estimating sales of $22.79 billion, up from $13.62 billion a year earlier.
Alphabet delayed the launch of Gemini 3.5 Pro from June.
The flagship model is designed to strengthen the company's position in AI coding tools and agentic AI applications, two of the fastest-growing areas of the artificial intelligence market.
The delay comes as Chinese open-source AI models continue to compete more aggressively with leading US developers and as investors increasingly question whether large technology companies are generating sufficient returns from heavy AI spending.
Dave Wagner, portfolio manager at Aptus Capital Advisors, said in a Reuters report, "While Google is missing the boat on AI coding and that's a very real growing concern ... Google's strategy is all about the ecosystem."
Guggenheim analyst Michael Morris maintained a Buy rating and a $450 price target on Alphabet ahead of the earnings release.
"Competitive noise creates attractive entry for full-stack AI leader," Morris said.
Freedom Capital Markets Chief Market Strategist Jay Woods also pointed to the Gemini delay as an important issue heading into earnings, saying investors will be looking for updates on the company's AI strategy.
"Watch for updates on Gemini and if the company’s massive AI spending continues," Woods said. "With billions being poured into chips, data centers, and Gemini development, Wall Street wants evidence that AI is driving growth rather than simply driving expenses."
Cloud growth and AI investments remain key focusAlphabet raised its 2026 capital expenditure guidance in April to between $180 billion and $190 billion.
The company has also announced plans to raise approximately $85 billion through equity offerings, including an investment from Berkshire Hathaway.
The company's cloud business continues to benefit from demand for AI infrastructure and custom AI chips, including multi-billion-dollar agreements with Meta Platforms and Anthropic.
Beyond the headline financial results, investors are expected to focus on Google Search advertising, YouTube advertising, Google Cloud performance, operating margins and capital expenditure plans.
Management commentary on Gemini, AI monetization and infrastructure investments will also be closely monitored as investors assess whether Alphabet's AI strategy is strengthening its broader business ecosystem.
Alphabet shares have declined about 9% since late April despite reporting a 63% increase in cloud sales during the previous quarter.
However, the stock remains nearly 13% higher for the year, making it the second-best performer among the Magnificent Seven group.
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Amazon Leo Satellite Connectivity signage is displayed during the annual Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas, Nevada on January 6, 2026. Patrick T. Fallon / AFP via Getty Images Amazon's Leo satellite business has appointed its first dedicated finance VP, another sign the company is building the satellite venture into a more independent business.
Mike Recupero, who most recently served as Alexa's finance chief, was named Leo's VP of finance earlier this month, according to people familiar with the move. The newly created role makes him the first VP solely overseeing Leo's finances.
Previously, Recupero spent about a year as GameStop's CFO after serving as finance chief for several Amazon businesses, including Prime Video and North America retail.
Until now, Leo's finances were overseen by executives who also managed Alexa, supported by more junior finance leaders.
The appointment reflects how Amazon is assembling a seasoned leadership team around Leo, formerly known as Project Kuiper.
Over the past two years, Leo has also recruited former GitLab chief revenue officer Chris Weber as vice president of sales and marketing and former T-Mobile executive Clint Patterson as chief marketing officer. VP of technology Rajeev Badyal leads the overall Leo business and reports to Panos Panay, SVP of devices, Alexa, and Leo.
Recupero will primarily oversee Leo's multibillion-dollar infrastructure buildout, including satellite manufacturing and launches, as well as the integration of Globalstar, the satellite communications company Amazon is acquiring for $11.6 billion, the people said.
Amit Singh has replaced Recupero as Alexa's finance lead.
Leo is one of Amazon's biggest long-term bets beyond its core retail and cloud businesses. CEO Andy Jassy previously said Leo already had a series of revenue commitments from enterprise and government customers and is expected to generate meaningful growth and returns for Amazon. The company said earlier this month that Leo has completed 14 missions and launched 396 satellites so far, making it the third-largest satellite constellation in orbit.
Wall Street is also growing more bullish on the business. Bank of America recently estimated Leo could generate $20 billion to $25 billion in annual revenue by 2032 and eventually be worth $200 billion to $275 billion.
The growing enthusiasm has not eliminated the risks. A Blue Origin rocket that Amazon plans to use for future Leo missions exploded during a ground test in June. Leo's VP Badyal sought to reassure employees at the time, saying such setbacks are an expected part of spaceflight and that the company would continue pressing ahead.
Amazon declined to comment.
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Eugene is Business Insider’s Chief Tech Correspondent, where he leads coverage of Amazon. His reporting spans the company’s retail operations, AWS, Alexa, and its secretive internal work culture.Previously, he worked at CNBC, Fortune Magazine Korea, and Japan's Yomiuri Shimbun. He holds degrees from NYU and Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism.In 2022, Eugene broke a story uncovering Amazon’s practice of deceptively enrolling customers in Prime and deliberately making cancellation difficult. A year later, the Federal Trade Commission sued the company, citing his reporting. That case culminated in a record $2.5 billion settlement in 2025.His reporting has earned multiple honors, including the SF Press Club’s Bay Area Journalism Award and SPJ NorCal’s Excellence in Journalism Award.Eugene lives in the Bay Area. Contact him via email at [email protected], or Signal, Telegram, or WhatsApp at 650-942-3061. Use a personal email address, a nonwork WiFi network, and a nonwork device; here's our guide to sharing information securely. ExpertiseAmazon, Jeff Bezos, Andy Jassy, e-commerce, and cloud computing.Popular ArticlesAmazon:Internal Amazon emails give an exclusive look at how CEO Andy Jassy has started to run the company, with obsessive attention to the retail business and what some employees feel is micromanagingAndy Jassy will be the next CEO of Amazon. Insiders dish on what it's like to work for Jeff Bezos' successor, who built AWS into a $40 billion business.Internal documents show Amazon has for years knowingly tricked people into signing up for Prime subscriptions. 'We have been deliberately confusing,' former employee says.Inside Amazon's flailing brick-and-mortar ambitions: missed projections, pressure to cut costs, and a war with Whole FoodsInside Amazon's complex employee-review system, where workers feel left in the dark and managers expect to give 5% of reports bad reviewsAfter 28 years, 'Day 2' finally arrives at AmazonAWS, Alexa, healthcare:Inside Amazon's struggle to break into the lucrative market for SaaS business applications, including an internal pitch to buy $38 billion HubSpotInside Amazon's struggle to crack Nvidia's AI-chip dominanceAmazon's AI data center dream runs into the reality of 'zombie' facilities, higher costs, and labor shortagesAmazon is gutting its voice assistant, Alexa. Employees describe a division in crisis and huge losses on 'a wasted opportunity.'Amazon is working on a new 'Remarkable Alexa,' but internal politics and technical issues plague the projectAmazon projected huge losses from its healthcare business in 2024, but strong sales growth, internal document reveals
My cost basis on Meta keeps climbing because I keep buying, and the reason is simple: the market is treating a compounding advertising monster like a runaway science experiment, and that gap is where my money keeps going.
Here is what I keep coming back to. Meta Platforms (NASDAQ:META | META Price Prediction) closed at $645.85 on July 20, down 1.99% YTD, while the business behind those shares delivered Q1 2026 EPS of $10.44 against $6.66 expected, a 56.79% beat and the fifth straight quarter topping consensus. Revenue grew 33.08% YoY to $56.31 billion. Net income jumped 60.86%. Operating margin sits at 41.4%. Return on equity is 30.24%. That is a compounding machine whose stock is confused about what it owns.
The Disconnect Is Priced In Meta trades at a P/E of 23 and a forward P/E of 21. Free cash flow yield is 3.25%, earnings yield 4.26%. The ad engine itself keeps widening: impressions +19% YoY, average price per ad +12% YoY, with 3.56 billion daily active people across the Family of Apps. Priced like a mature utility, selling attention on the largest advertising surface in human history.
The balance sheet supports the buildout. Debt-to-equity of 0.386, net debt/EBITDA 0.47, interest coverage 71.48x. Full-year 2025 operating cash flow of $115.8 billion against 2026 capex guidance of $125-145 billion means Meta funds its AI push from its own cash register. Capital returns kept flowing: $26.25 billion in buybacks in 2025 and a $0.53 quarterly dividend. CEO Mark Zuckerberg framed Q1 as “a milestone quarter with strong momentum across our apps and the release of our first model from Meta Superintelligence Labs.”
Why Not Microsoft I own some Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT). When the same dollar has to choose, Meta wins on the numbers today. Microsoft trades at a P/E of 29 versus Meta’s 23. Its P/FCF is 41.73 versus Meta’s 30.76. Earnings yield of 3.41% lags Meta’s 4.26%. Meta grew Q1 revenue 33.1% YoY, Microsoft grew 18.3%. Meta’s net income rose 60.86%, Microsoft’s 23.06%. YTD, Microsoft is down 16.45%, and the valuation gap has widened further. Microsoft pays a 0.81% yield to Meta’s 0.375%, which I take in the sleeve where I own MSFT. My marginal dollar still goes to Meta.
The Real Risk Capex. FY2026 guidance was raised to $125-145 billion. Reality Labs alone lost $4.03 billion in Q1. If the return on that spend disappoints, free cash flow compresses and today’s cheap multiple looks ordinary. I watch it. What keeps me buying is that the ad engine is already monetizing AI: better targeting is why price per ad grew 12% and impressions grew 19% in the same quarter. The return is showing up in the reported numbers.
Meta prints cash, dominates attention, and trades like a value stock. As long as those three sentences remain true together, my finger stays on the buy button.
LOS ANGELES, July 21, 2026 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Glancy Prongay Wolke & Rotter LLP reminds investors of the upcoming August 11, 2026 deadline to file a lead plaintiff motion in the class action filed on behalf of investors who purchased or otherwise acquired Microsoft Corporation (“Microsoft” or the “Company”) (NASDAQ: MSFT) common stock between May 1, 2025 and January 28, 2026, inclusive (the “Class Period”).
IF YOU SUFFERED A LOSS ON YOUR MICROSOFT INVESTMENTS, CLICK HERE TO INQUIRE ABOUT POTENTIALLY PURSUING CLAIMS TO RECOVER YOUR LOSS UNDER THE FEDERAL SECURITIES LAWS.
What Happened?
On January 28, 2026, Microsoft announced disappointing results for its second quarter of fiscal 2026, revealing that growth of its cloud computing platform, Azure, had slowed suddenly and fallen below analyst expectations due primarily to computational capacity constraints, as the Company had diverted central processing unit and graphics processing unit capacity to applications for its generative AI chatbot, Copilot, and AI-related research and development. The Company also revealed that its capital expenditures had increased to $37.5 billion during the quarter, causing the Company’s capital expenditures for the first six months of fiscal 2026 to expand to $72.4 billion compared to $88.2 billion for the entirety of fiscal 2025, largely due to AI-related research and development and Copilot development and capacity buildout costs. Additionally, Microsoft disclosed that the amount of paying users of Copilot was well below analyst estimates.
On this news, Microsoft’s stock price fell $48.13, or 9.99%, to close at $433.50 per share on January 29, 2026, thereby injuring investors.
What Is The Lawsuit About?
The complaint filed in this class action alleges that throughout the Class Period, Defendants made materially false and/or misleading statements, as well as failed to disclose material adverse facts about the Company’s business, operations, and prospects. Specifically, Defendants failed to disclose to investors: (1) that Microsoft’s Copilot family of products had experienced significant brand positioning, user experience, usage, data siloing, computational capacity, organizational, and interoperability problems; (2) that Microsoft’s flagship proprietary AI model ranked well below competitors on a number of benchmark tests; (3) that Microsoft needed to increase by billions of dollars its capital expenditures and divert GPU and CPU capacity away from fulfilling demand for its profitable Azure services in order to improve the competitive positioning of its critical Copilot family of products and increase its AI-related R&D; (4) that, as a result of the foregoing, Microsoft had failed to convert a significant percentage of its commercial Microsoft 365 users to paid Copilot subscriptions and the Company’s Copilot offerings had lost market share to rival products, a trend that was increasing; and (5) as a result, Defendants’ positive statements about the Company’s business, operations, and prospects were materially misleading and/or lacked a reasonable basis at all relevant times.
If you purchased or otherwise acquired Microsoft common stock during the Class Period, you may move the Court no later than August 11, 2026 to request appointment as lead plaintiff in this putative class action lawsuit.
Contact Us To Participate or Learn More:
If you wish to learn more about this action, or if you have any questions concerning this announcement or your rights or interests with respect to these matters, please contact us:
Charles Linehan, Esq.,
Glancy Prongay Wolke & Rotter LLP,
1925 Century Park East, Suite 2100,
Los Angeles California 90067
Email: [email protected]
Telephone: 310-201-9150,
Toll-Free: 888-773-9224
Visit our website at www.glancylaw.com.
Follow us for updates on LinkedIn, Twitter, or Facebook.
If you inquire by email, please include your mailing address, telephone number and number of shares purchased.
To be a member of the class action you need not take any action at this time; you may retain counsel of your choice or take no action and remain an absent member of the class action.
This press release may be considered Attorney Advertising in some jurisdictions under the applicable law and ethical rules.
Contact Us:
Glancy Prongay Wolke & Rotter LLP,
1925 Century Park East, Suite 2100
Los Angeles, CA 90067
Charles Linehan
Email: [email protected]
Telephone: 310-201-9150
Toll-Free: 888-773-9224
Visit our website at: www.glancylaw.com.
NEW YORK, July 21, 2026 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Pomerantz LLP announces that a class action lawsuit has been filed against Microsoft Corporation (“Microsoft” or the “Company”) (NASDAQ: MSFT). Such investors are advised to contact Danielle Peyton at [email protected] or 646-581-9980, (or 888.4-POMLAW), toll-free, Ext. 7980. Those who inquire by e-mail are encouraged to include their mailing address, telephone number, and the number of shares purchased.
The class action concerns whether Microsoft and certain of its officers and/or directors have engaged in securities fraud or other unlawful business practices.
You have until August 11, 2026, to ask the Court to appoint you as Lead Plaintiff for the class if you purchased or otherwise acquired Microsoft securities during the Class Period. A copy of the Complaint can be obtained at www.pomerantzlaw.com.
[Click here for information about joining the class action]
On January 28, 2026, Microsoft announced disappointing results for its fiscal second quarter ended December 31, 2025. First, during the quarter Microsoft’s Azure growth had slowed suddenly and fallen below analyst expectations. During the related earnings call, CFO Amy E. Hood revealed that the slower Azure growth was primarily due to computational capacity constraints, as Microsoft had diverted CPU and GPU capacity to Copilot applications and AI-related R&D. Second, Microsoft revealed that its capital expenditures had increased to $37.5 billion during the quarter, causing Microsoft’s capital expenditures for the first six months of its fiscal 2026 to increase to $72.4 billion compared to $88.2 billion for all of Microsoft’s fiscal 2025. Third, Microsoft revealed, for the first time, that the number of paid Microsoft 365 Copilot seats totaled only 15 million to date, materially below analyst estimates and a fraction of the more than 450 million commercial Microsoft 365 users.
On this news, the price of Microsoft stock fell nearly 10%.
Then, on February 3, 2026, The Wall Street Journal revealed, in an article titled “Microsoft’s Pivotal AI Product Is Running Into Big Problems,” that severe challenges and functionality issues had plagued Microsoft’s Copilot offerings, leading to Copilot losing market share during the Class Period to competing products such as Google’s Gemini. The price of Microsoft stock continued to fall in the days after Microsoft’s second quarter 2026 earnings announcement as the market continued to digest the adverse news and sources such as The Wall Street Journal revealed new adverse information.
Thereafter, on March 17, 2026, The Wall Street Journal revealed in an article titled “Microsoft Seeks More Coherence in AI Efforts With Copilot Reorganization” that Microsoft was reorganizing its Copilot product teams to unify commercial and consumer versions partly in response to the challenges revealed by The Wall Street Journal’s prior reporting on Copilot’s problem-plagued development and disappointing customer adoption.
On this news, the price of Microsoft stock continued to fall.
Pomerantz LLP, with offices in New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, London, Paris, and Tel Aviv, is acknowledged as one of the premier firms in the areas of corporate, securities, and antitrust class litigation. Founded by the late Abraham L. Pomerantz, known as the dean of the class action bar, Pomerantz pioneered the field of securities class actions. Today, more than 85 years later, Pomerantz continues in the tradition he established, fighting for the rights of the victims of securities fraud, breaches of fiduciary duty, and corporate misconduct. The Firm has recovered numerous multimillion-dollar damages awards on behalf of class members. See www.pomlaw.com.
Attorney advertising. Prior results do not guarantee similar outcomes.
Key Takeaways AMD will ship Helios systems to Microsoft in the second half of 2026 for Azure AI workloads.Helios combines Instinct GPUs, EPYC CPUs, Pensando networking and ROCm software.AMD sees hyperscaler partnerships driving multi-generation AI demand and data center growth. Advanced Micro Devices (AMD - Free Report) is strengthening its long-term bond with Microsoft (MSFT - Free Report) to expand the deployment of its AI infrastructure across Microsoft Azure. Under the agreement, Microsoft will deploy AMD’s Helios rack-scale platform, combining Instinct MI455X GPUs, 6th Gen EPYC “Venice” CPUs, Pensando networking and ROCm software, to power frontier AI inference, Azure AI services and customer workloads. Azure will also introduce new EPYC-powered virtual machine series and expand the use of Pensando DPUs to enhance networking performance. AMD expects to begin shipping Helios systems, including to Microsoft, in the second half of 2026.
The expanded partnership strengthens AMD’s position as a strategic AI infrastructure supplier for hyperscale cloud providers by expanding beyond GPUs into CPUs, networking and software. AMD’s AI revenue opportunity expands through deployment of its integrated Helios rack-scale platform for large-scale inference workloads. The extended partnership with Microsoft expands AMD’s presence in Azure AI services and enterprise AI deployments, creating additional long-term infrastructure demand.
Management has highlighted that AI infrastructure demand is increasingly being driven by deep strategic partnerships with hyperscalers rather than one-time hardware sales. The company said customers are moving from pilot projects to large-scale production deployments, resulting in multi-generation engagements for both EPYC CPUs and Instinct GPUs. It cited partnerships with Meta, OpenAI and Microsoft as evidence that customers are co-engineering future AI platforms with AMD. These partnerships strengthen demand for Helios rack-scale systems and support AMD’s goal of generating tens of billions of dollars in annual Data Center AI revenues over time.
AMD expects server CPU revenues to grow more than 70% year over year in the second quarter of 2026, with robust growth continuing through the second half of 2026 and into 2027 as sixth-generation EPYC “Venice” processors ramp. AMD believes inferencing and agentic AI are fundamentally increasing CPU requirements for orchestration, data movement and head-node functions. AMD doubled its 2030 server CPU total addressable market estimate from about $60 billion to more than $120 billion.
Tough Competition Hurts AMD’s ProspectsAMD’s prospects suffer from stiff competition. NVIDIA (NVDA - Free Report) and Broadcom (AVGO - Free Report) are major competitors in the Data Center space.
NVIDIA is at the center of AI computing, with its products widely used across data centers, gaming and autonomous vehicles. The company’s newer Hopper 200 and Blackwell GPU platforms are being adopted quickly as customers work to grow their AI infrastructure. Data Center revenues reached $75.2 billion in the first quarter of fiscal 2027, up 92% from a year ago and up 21% sequentially, driven by the ramp-up of Blackwell 300 products and demand for InfiniBand, Spectrum-X Ethernet and NVLink solutions. NVIDIA remains AMD's primary rival in GPU-accelerated supercomputing.
Broadcom is benefiting from strong demand for its networking products and custom AI accelerators. In the second quarter of fiscal 2026, AI semiconductor revenues reached a record $10.8 billion, up 143% year over year and above management’s outlook. Broadcom expects AI semiconductor revenues to reach $16 billion in the third quarter of fiscal 2026, up more than 200% year over year. For fiscal 2026, management expects AI semiconductor revenues of $56 billion, up approximately 180% from fiscal 2025. Broadcom also reiterated that AI semiconductor revenues are expected to exceed $100 billion in fiscal 2027.
AMD’s Share Price Performance, Valuation & EstimatesAMD shares have jumped 147.3% year to date, outperforming the broader Zacks Computer and Technology sector’s growth of 12.1%.
AMD Stock’s Price Performance
Image Source: Zacks Investment Research
AMD stock is overvalued, with a forward 12-month price/sales of 13.09X compared with the broader sector’s 6.6X. AMD has a Value Score of F.
AMD Valuation
Image Source: Zacks Investment Research
The Zacks Consensus Estimate for 2026 earnings is pegged at $7.28 per share, up 1% over the past 30 days, suggesting 74.58% growth from the figure reported in 2025.
AMD currently carries a Zacks Rank #2 (Buy). You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here.
NEW YORK, July 21, 2026 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Pomerantz LLP is investigating claims on behalf of investors of Alibaba Group Holding Limited (“Alibaba” or the “Company”) (NYSE: BABA). Such investors are advised to contact Danielle Peyton at [email protected] or 646-581-9980, ext. 7980.
The investigation concerns whether Alibaba and certain of its officers and/or directors have engaged in securities fraud or other unlawful business practices.
[Click here for information about joining the class action]
On June 24, 2026, the Financial Times reported that Anthropic has accused Alibaba “of obtaining illicit access to Claude by creating fake accounts designed to access the AI model which the American company does not offer to Chinese groups.”
On this news, Alibaba’s American Depositary Receipt (“ADR”) price fell $7.53 per ADR, or 7.34%, over the following two trading sessions, to close at $95.07 per ADR on June 25, 2026.
Then, on July 1, 2026, the U.S. Department of Justice issued a press release announcing that Alibaba had “entered a non-prosecution agreement to pay $600 million to resolve the Justice Department’s allegations that they violated the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act (FDCA) by failing to prevent merchants from selling and importing illegal pharmaceuticals, controlled substances, listed chemicals, and pill presses into the United States” through Alibaba’s e-commerce platforms.
On this news, Alibaba’s ADR price fell $1.85 per ADR, or 1.9%, to close at $96.14 per ADR on July 2, 2026.
Pomerantz LLP, with offices in New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, London, Paris, and Tel Aviv, is acknowledged as one of the premier firms in the areas of corporate, securities, and antitrust class litigation. Founded by the late Abraham L. Pomerantz, known as the dean of the class action bar, Pomerantz pioneered the field of securities class actions. Today, more than 85 years later, Pomerantz continues in the tradition he established, fighting for the rights of the victims of securities fraud, breaches of fiduciary duty, and corporate misconduct. The Firm has recovered numerous multimillion-dollar damages awards on behalf of class members. See www.pomlaw.com.
Attorney advertising. Prior results do not guarantee similar outcomes.
Nvidia (NVDA +1.93%) was founded in 1993 by Jensen Huang, Curtis Priem, and Chris Malachowsky. The trio of engineers and semiconductor designers had a vision to bring 3D video graphics to computers, and they quickly succeeded.
They took Nvidia public in January 1999, raising $42 million from investors to fund the production of its revolutionary GeForce 256, which was the world's first graphics processing unit (GPU) for computers. The company's modern GPUs have become the primary component in the artificial intelligence (AI) data center hardware stack, creating the biggest financial opportunity in the history of the semiconductor industry.
Nvidia is now the most valuable enterprise in the world, and had you parked $5,000 in its stock back in 1999 and never sold, you would be filthy rich today. Here's exactly how big your fortune would be.
Image source: Nvidia.
Nvidia's chips have changed the world Nvidia commercialized its first computer graphics chip in 1995, but its GeForce 256 GPU delivered a whopping 50% increase in processing power four years later. More importantly, it cemented GeForce as one of the graphics industry's most recognizable brands.
But Nvidia never stopped innovating. Not only does it continue to make some of the best GPUs for computer games and digital 3D simulations, but it has also adapted these chips for data centers, robots, and even cars. While a traditional central processing unit typically has a handful of cores, a single GPU can have thousands, so it's better suited for rapidly analyzing high volumes of data.
Therefore, GPUs are ideal for developing AI models, which are constantly ingesting new information, analyzing it, and then using it to generate outputs. Nvidia's Blackwell GB300 GPU is widely considered to be the best data center chip in the world for processing AI workloads, but it's about to be superseded by a more powerful replacement built on the company's new Vera Rubin architecture.
A single data center can house thousands of GPUs, resulting in explosive demand as tech giants battle for AI supremacy. According to Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang, every frontier model company plans to adopt the new Vera Rubin chips when they start shipping over the next few months. That wasn't the case when the previous Blackwell chips launched. In other words, GPU demand still hasn't peaked.
Nvidia has become a financial behemoth The semiconductor industry used to be very cyclical. Companies would build data centers and use them for several years before upgrading their components, resulting in lumpy revenue for chipmakers from year to year. The AI boom changed that, at least for now, because Nvidia is releasing faster chips on an annual basis, and data center operators are buying them hand over fist.
As a result, Nvidia's revenue is exploding higher. It topped $215 billion during the company's 2026 fiscal year (which ended on Jan. 25), representing a whopping 65% growth from the prior year.
Furthermore, it represents a 136,372% increase compared with Nvidia's fiscal 1999 revenue of $158 million.
NVDA Revenue (Annual) data by YCharts
According to Wall Street's average estimates (provided by Yahoo! Finance), Nvidia's revenue could grow to $393 billion during its current 2027 fiscal year, and then to $559 billion in fiscal 2028. If recent results are anything to go by, around 90% of that revenue will come from the data center business alone, thanks to red-hot demand for AI GPUs.
Here's how much a $5,000 investment in Nvidia's IPO would be worth today Nvidia completed its initial public offering (IPO) on Jan. 22, 1999, at $12 per share. The company has since created so much value that management executed six stock splits to ensure its shares remained affordable for small investors.
Had you invested $5,000 at its IPO, you would have acquired 416 shares at $12 each. Adjusting for the stock splits, you would have 199,680 shares today with a cost basis of $0.025 per share.
Considering Nvidia stock trades at $203.28 as I write this, that translates to a return of 813,020%. In dollar terms, that initial investment of $5,000 would be worth an eye-popping $40.6 million today. Plus, Nvidia has paid a total of $0.23365 per share in dividends (split-adjusted) since fiscal 2012, so you would have also earned $46,655 in cash payments.
Today's Change
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Current Price
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207.20
Investors who don't already own Nvidia stock might be wondering if it's still a good buy. In my opinion, the answer is yes, because it's still attractively valued despite its past gains. Plus, although the AI boom is well under way, Nvidia will also benefit from a multitude of other emerging industries, such as autonomous driving, robotics, and quantum computing, which will require high volumes of chips and components in the future.
Analyst’s Disclosure: I/we have no stock, option or similar derivative position in any of the companies mentioned, and no plans to initiate any such positions within the next 72 hours. I wrote this article myself, and it expresses my own opinions. I am not receiving compensation for it (other than from Seeking Alpha). I have no business relationship with any company whose stock is mentioned in this article.
Seeking Alpha's Disclosure: Past performance is no guarantee of future results. No recommendation or advice is being given as to whether any investment is suitable for a particular investor. Any views or opinions expressed above may not reflect those of Seeking Alpha as a whole. Seeking Alpha is not a licensed securities dealer, broker or US investment adviser or investment bank. Our analysts are third party authors that include both professional investors and individual investors who may not be licensed or certified by any institute or regulatory body.
Nvidia Corporation is rated Strong Buy, driven by its transition to a rack-scale AI utility model and aggressive CPU disintermediation via Vera. NVDA's Vera CPU and Rubin architecture enable 35X lower compute costs, accelerating agentic AI adoption and expanding total addressable market. Key risks include gross margin compression from HBM memory pricing and systemic credit contagion from circular-financed NeoClouds like Nebius.
Nvidia has held the position as the world's biggest company since about a year ago, when it became the first to reach $4 trillion in market value. It soared past former leaders Apple and Microsoft. But in recent days, Apple, which hasn't climbed as much as its peers during the artificial intelligence (AI) boom, has been making a comeback.
And on July 17, Apple even slipped ahead of Nvidia to become – at least for part of the trading session – the world's biggest company. By the end of the day, though, Nvidia returned to the lead with a value of $4.9 trillion. That's compared to $4.89 trillion for Apple.
As these tech giants vie for the position as the world's biggest company, which is the better buy now? Let's find out.
APPLE BRIEFLY OVERTAKES NVIDIA AS WORLD'S MOST VALUABLE COMPANY AMID AI INVESTMENT DOUBTS
Apple even slipped ahead of Nvidia on July 17 to become – at least for part of the trading session – the world's biggest company. (Adam Gray for Fox News Digital)
The case for NvidiaNvidia stock has soared more than 300% over the past three years amid excitement about its position in the AI market. The company is the No. 1 designer of graphic processing units (GPUs), the chips used to power AI development and use. This strength, along with Nvidia's full portfolio of related products and services, has generated double- and triple-digit earnings growth in recent years.
For example, in the recent quarter, Nvidia's revenue surged 85% to more than $81 billion, and this was at a high level of profitability on sales, as we can see through the company's gross margin – that figure has exceeded 70% quarter after quarter.
JENSEN HUANG SAYS NVIDIA'S NEW RTX SPARK CHIP WILL REINVENT THE PC
Nvidia stock has soared more than 300% over the past three years. (Patrick T. Fallon/AFP via Getty Images)
Nvidia focuses on innovation, pledging to update its GPUs on an annual basis, and this has helped it stay ahead. The company has also steadily expanded its reach in order to make it the key place to go for anything AI. In the latest quarter, Nvidia announced the upcoming release of its first stand-alone central processing unit (CPU), a move that opens the door to a $200 billion market.
Investors have piled into Nvidia's stock in recent years, understanding that an investment in this company should put them on track to benefit from the AI revolution.
The case for AppleApple shares have advanced – but not as much as those of Nvidia. Over the past three years, Apple has climbed about 70%. The company has been slower to invest in and apply AI than many of its peers – for example, it only began rolling out AI features across its devices in the fall of 2024, and the rollout continues. So, investors aiming to get in on potential AI leaders turned away from Apple and chose companies that were investing more aggressively in the space.
APPLE TO INVEST $30 BILLION IN US CHIP MANUFACTURING
This trend, however, hasn't hurt Apple's earnings growth. In fact, the company has proven itself to be a player investors can count on for progress in this area. Apple has a fantastic moat, or competitive advantage, and this is its brand – customers love the iPhone and won't easily switch to another. In the first quarter, the iPhone 17 was the world's top-selling smartphone, according to Counterpoint Research.
Apple shares have climbed about 70% over the past three years. (Apple Inc./Reuters)
Apple also is benefiting from its sales of services, with services revenue reaching records quarter after quarter. After building up more than 2.5 billion active devices over the years, Apple now can count on these devices for recurrent revenue. When customers sign up for digital entertainment or storage, for example, this represents a regular stream of income for the company.
Today, investors may be turning to Apple as they recognize these strengths and as they seek an alternative to companies heavily exposed to AI.
The better buy?Nvidia and Apple have proven their earnings strength and leadership over time. So either makes a solid long-term investment. But if you could only choose one to buy right now, which one should you go for?
Nvidia clearly beats Apple when it comes to valuation. At these levels, the chip giant looks dirt cheap, particularly considering the AI empire it's built and its long-term prospects in the field. It's important to note that even if AI stocks slump temporarily, the AI story remains strong, with the technology already put to use in many areas.
Ticker Security Last Change Change % AAPL APPLE INC. 326.59 -7.15 -2.14% NVDA NVIDIA CORP. 203.28 +0.47 +0.23% So now is a fantastic moment to get in on Nvidia at these levels. That said, cautious investors who aim to avoid any AI turbulence still may prefer picking up Apple shares, as even at today's level, the stock has room to run.
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Adria Cimino has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends Apple, Microsoft, and Nvidia. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.
While both funds provide broad international equity access, State Street SPDR Portfolio MSCI Global Stock Market ETF (SPGM +1.19%) offers a lower expense ratio and broader diversification than iShares MSCI World ETF (URTH +1.00%).
Comparing URTH and SPGM reveals two distinct global strategies. URTH focuses exclusively on companies in developed economies, while SPGM provides all-cap exposure across both developed and emerging markets, potentially serving as a more comprehensive core holding for long-term investors seeking total market representation.
Snapshot (cost & size)MetricURTHSPGMIssueriSharesSPDRShare price$201.10 (as of 2026-07-20)$84.28 (as of 2026-07-20)Expense ratio0.24%0.09%1-yr return (as of 2026-07-20)19.50%23.10%Dividend yield1.40%1.80%Beta0.950.92AUM$8.0B$1.7BBeta measures price volatility relative to the S&P 500; beta is calculated from monthly returns over the available fund history (up to five years). The 1-yr return represents total return over the trailing 12 months. Dividend yield is the trailing-12-month distribution yield as of the close of trading on July 20th.
SPGM is the more affordable option with a 0.09% expense ratio compared to 0.24% for URTH. Additionally, SPGM currently offers a higher payout, providing a 0.42 percentage point yield advantage over its competitor.
Performance & risk comparisonMetricURTHSPGMMax drawdown (5 yr)(26.10%)(25.90%)Growth of $1,000 over 5 years (total return)$1,703$1,688What's insideState Street SPDR Portfolio MSCI Global Stock Market ETF replicates the MSCI ACWI IMI Index, providing exposure to 2,927 holdings across developed and emerging markets. This all-cap strategy includes large, mid, and small-cap companies, which may help mitigate country-specific risks. Its largest positions include Nvidia (NVDA +1.85%) at 4.1%, Apple (AAPL +0.50%) at 3.7%, and Microsoft (MSFT 0.97%) at 2.3%. The portfolio is weighted toward technology at 31%, financial services at 17%, and industrials at 13%. It was launched in 2012. State Street SPDR Portfolio MSCI Global Stock Market ETF has paid $1.54 per share over the trailing 12 months, which on its recent ~$84.28 share price works out to a 1.80% yield.
iShares MSCI World ETF focuses on a narrower index of 1,309 companies located solely within developed global economies. This concentration results in a slightly different risk profile compared to more comprehensive global funds. Its largest positions include Nvidia at 5.2%, Apple at 4.8%, and Microsoft at 3%. The fund allocates 31% to technology, 16% to financial services, and 11% to industrials. It was launched in 2012. iShares MSCI World ETF has paid $2.84 per share over the trailing 12 months, which on its recent ~$201.10 share price works out to a 1.40% yield.
Which fund is the better buy?There’s a world of stocks to be had with both of these ETFs, but looking under the hood, there are key differences for investors to weigh.
URTH, the iShares MSCI World ETF, ignores a portion of the world, emerging markets, to focus on the developed world that generates the vast majority of stock market gains. Since the U.S. is such a significant part of the world economy, it accounts for 72% of the holdings of URTH, with the balance in markets like Europe and developed Asian countries, primarily Japan. That also means all its top 10 holdings are U.S. stocks (which is true of its competitor here as well).
SPGM, the State Street SPDR Portfolio MSCI Global Stock Market ETF, accounts for emerging markets, which make up 6% of its portfolio, while the U.S. is 63% of holdings, with the developed world at 31%. SPGM also has exposure to small caps, which URTH doesn’t. SPGM has 5% of its portfolio in small caps, which means weightings to large and mid caps are slightly less than URTH’s.
Given the slightly different approaches to representing global equity markets, it’s no surprise there is a difference in performance. The inclusion of small caps means SPGM has captured some of the rally small cap stocks have been enjoying. Small caps are having their best year since 1991, making up for years of underperformance.
Year-to-date SPGM is 12.3%, compared to 9.9% for URTH, continuing the 1-year besting of URTH noted in the table above. Similarly, over the past three years, SPGM edges URTH 20.2% to 19.4% annualized returns. Longer term, URTH nicks the lead from SPGM by virtue of the small cap sector’s past underperformance, but the differences are only slight. Both funds have returned about 11.5% and 13.25% to investors over the 5-year and 10-year time frames.
Given SPGM also has a small maximum drawdown compared to URTH and a better dividend yield, the best way to play the world of stocks is to add SPGM to your portfolio.
For more guidance on ETF investing, check out the full guide at this link.
For more than three years now, Nvidia (NVDA +1.85%) has been at the center of the most significant technology shift in decades. The company was a linchpin in the early 2023 advent of artificial intelligence (AI) and has been at the heart of the AI boom ever since. The chipmaker has been investing in ancillary products and adjacent industries, thereby expanding its reach. In the latest development, Nvidia significantly increased its position in one area of AI infrastructure: neoclouds.
According to a recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), Nvidia now has 12% of its investment portfolio in Nebius (NBIS +16.41%), after increasing its stake by more than $3.8 billion. Nvidia previously owned roughly 1.1 million shares of Nebius stock, but boosted its stake by more than 21 million shares and now owns roughly 9.3% of the company.
Let's take a look at what prompted that move and why investors should be paying attention.
Image source: The Motley Fool.
Neocloud 101To understand why this is a big deal, it's worth taking a step back to review what Nebius does. The concept of cloud computing is well known to most investors. The cloud, as it's commonly called, allows internet users to access applications, data storage, data processing, and AI. Cloud use provides improved security, increased flexibility, and scalability, making it an attractive option for many companies. Furthermore, cloud access to AI models and processing has supercharged adoption.
Neocloud operators fill a special function in the AI boom. These companies have stockpiled the graphics processing units (GPUs) and other infrastructure needed to facilitate AI and other high-performance computing. The offering has been dubbed GPU-as-a-service (GPUaaS).
Nebius is one of the leading providers of these services, offering an "AI-centric cloud platform building large, cost-efficient GPU clusters to service the explosive growth of the global AI industry," according to its website.
The company's financial results are telling. In the first quarter, it generated revenue of $399 million, which soared 684% year over year, albeit from a small base. Perhaps more telling is the annualized run rate for its core AI services of $1.92 billion, an increase of 674%.
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Does Huang know something Wall Street doesn't?Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang is the architect of this investment, which includes the ownership of 1.19 million shares previously reported and the addition of 21 million shares from a warrant Nvidia acquired in Q1. In the regulatory filing, Nvidia revealed that it was prohibited from selling the newly acquired shares before Sept. 11, 2026.
This increased investment marks a huge vote of confidence from Nvidia. This shouldn't come as a surprise. At the keynote address at the Computex technology trade show in Taipei, Taiwan, last month, Huang lauded Nebius as one of a select group of "world-class AI clouds." He cited the neocloud's impressive customer list and Nvidia's own experience working with the company. "We worked with Nebius, and they are growing incredibly fast," Huang said.
Don't take his word for it. Neocloud revenues are expected to grow from $25 billion in 2025 to $400 billion by 2031, a compound annual growth rate of 58%, according to a report by Synergy Research Group. The report goes on to say, "Neocloud providers are capturing an increasing share of the fastest-growing segments of the cloud market, fundamentally reshaping the competitive dynamics of AI infrastructure."
Nebius isn't yet profitable, as the company scrambles to build out its infrastructure to meet its soaring customer demand. Wall Street expects revenue growth of 541% in 2026 and 238% in 2027, and 63% of analysts rate the stock a buy or strong buy.
At 64 times sales, the stock certainly doesn't look cheap. That said, Jensen Huang has his finger on the pulse of all things AI and just increased Nvidia's stake by more than 18x, which suggests he believes strongly in Nebius’s future.
That's why investors should be paying attention -- and why Nebius stock is a buy.
Analyst’s Disclosure: I/we have a beneficial long position in the shares of NVDA either through stock ownership, options, or other derivatives. I wrote this article myself, and it expresses my own opinions. I am not receiving compensation for it (other than from Seeking Alpha). I have no business relationship with any company whose stock is mentioned in this article.
Seeking Alpha's Disclosure: Past performance is no guarantee of future results. No recommendation or advice is being given as to whether any investment is suitable for a particular investor. Any views or opinions expressed above may not reflect those of Seeking Alpha as a whole. Seeking Alpha is not a licensed securities dealer, broker or US investment adviser or investment bank. Our analysts are third party authors that include both professional investors and individual investors who may not be licensed or certified by any institute or regulatory body.
3M delivered strong Q2 results, beating EPS and revenue estimates, and raised FY 2026 guidance, sparking a 6% earnings-day rally. I maintain a "Hold" rating as MMM trades near intrinsic value; valuation appears fair, and technicals suggest sideways action in the near term. Q2 growth was driven by General Industrial, Safety, and Electronics, offsetting Consumer weakness; 3M launched 92 new products and returned $1.4 billion to shareholders.
Key Takeaways 3M topped Q2 earnings and revenue estimates as organic sales grew across key industrial markets.MMM saw strong Safety & Industrial and Transportation & Electronics growth, offsetting Consumer weakness.3M raised its 2026 adjusted EPS outlook and expects revenue growth above 4.5% with free cash flow over 100%. 3M Company (MMM - Free Report) reported second-quarter 2026 results, wherein both earnings and revenues surpassed the Zacks Consensus Estimate.
3M delivered adjusted earnings of $2.40 per share, which surpassed the Zacks Consensus Estimate of $2.27 by 5.7%. The bottom line increased 11% year over year.
The company reported net revenues (on a GAAP basis) of $6.5 billion in the quarter. The metric increased 2.4% year over year. Organic sales increased 2.3%. Foreign currency translation had a positive impact of 0.7% while acquisitions/divestitures had a negative impact of 0.6%.
MMM’s adjusted net revenues of $6.5 billion topped the consensus estimate of $6.4 billion and grew 5.5%. On an adjusted basis, organic revenues increased 5.4% year over year. The results were supported by strength in general industrial, safety and electronics end markets.
Region-wise, adjusted organic sales in the Latin Americas rose 5.4% year over year, other Asia adjusted organic sales increased 2.9% and China adjusted organic sales increased 9.2%. Adjusted organic sales from businesses in Europe, the Middle East and Africa grew 2.3%.
3M’s Q2 Segmental ResultsRevenues from Safety and Industrial totaled $3.09 billion, up 8.2% year over year, driven by strength in industrial specialties, adhesives, abrasives and electrical markets. The Zacks Consensus Estimate for the segment’s revenues was pegged at $3.02 billion. While organic revenues increased 8.2% and foreign currency translation had a 1.3% favorable impact, divestitures had an adverse impact of 1.3%.
Revenues from Transportation & Electronics totaled $2.07 billion, reflecting a year-over-year increase of 6.2%. The results were driven by strength across semiconductor, aerospace and data center markets. The consensus estimate for the segment’s revenues was pegged at $2.01 billion. The segment’s organic sales increased 5.9%. Foreign currency translation had a 0.5% favorable impact, while divestiture had an adverse impact of 0.2% on revenues.
Revenues from the Consumer segment decreased 1.8% year over year to $1.25 billion. The consensus estimate for the segment’s revenues was pegged at $1.29 billion. Organic sales decreased 2.1% while movements in foreign currencies had a positive impact of 0.3%.
MMM’s Margin Profile3M’s cost of sales increased 4.7% year over year to $3.82 billion. Selling, general and administrative expenses decreased 16.3% to $1.06 billion. Research, development and related expenses increased 4.9% year over year to $302 million.
In the second quarter, 3M reported an operating income of $984 million, down 13.7% from the year-ago period. The operating margin contracted to 15.1% from 18%, due to higher operating expenses.
MMM’s adjusted operating income increased 7.2% year over year to $1.62 billion. The adjusted operating margin was 24.9% compared with 24.5% in the year-ago quarter.
3M’s Balance Sheet & Cash FlowExiting the second quarter of 2026, 3M had cash and cash equivalents of $2.96 billion compared with $5.24 billion at the end of December 2025. Long-term debt was $10.90 billion at the end of the quarter compared with $10.93 billion at the end of December 2025.
3M generated net cash of $986 million in operating activities against $954 million cash used in the year-ago quarter. Capital used for purchasing property, plant and equipment increased 7.2% to $223 million.
Adjusted free cash flow at the end of the quarter was $1.35 billion, up 5% year over year. Adjusted free cash flow conversion was 107% in the quarter.
In the first six months of 2026, 3M rewarded its shareholders with dividend payouts of $0.8 billion and share repurchases totaled $3 billion.
MMM’s 2026 GuidanceFor 2026, MMM expects adjusted earnings to be in the range of $8.80-$8.95 per share compared with $8.50-$8.70 projected earlier. The midpoint of the guided range is about $8.875, which reflects an increase from earnings of $8.06 per share reported in 2025.
Adjusted total revenue growth is projected to be above 4.5%. The company expects the adjusted free cash flow conversion rate to be more than 100%, with adjusted operating cash flow of $5.8-$6.0 billion.
Zacks Rank & Other Key PicksThe company currently carries a Zacks Rank #2 (Buy). Some other top-ranked stocks from the same space are discussed below:
Duluth Holdings (DLTH - Free Report) presently sports a Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy). You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank stocks here.
Duluth’s earnings surpassed the consensus estimate in each of the trailing four quarters. The average earnings surprise was 107.5%. In the past 60 days, the Zacks Consensus Estimate for DLTH’s fiscal 2027 bottom line has increased 45.8%.
Grupo Cibest S.A. (CIB - Free Report) presently sports a Zacks Rank of 1. Grupo Cibest’s earnings surpassed the consensus estimate twice and missed on the other two occasions in the trailing four quarters. The average earnings surprise was 0.3%. In the past 60 days, the Zacks Consensus Estimate for CIB’s 2026 earnings has increased 2.9%.
Vince Holding (VNCE - Free Report) currently carries a Zacks Rank of 2. Vince Holding’s earnings topped the consensus estimate thrice and missed once in the trailing four quarters. The average earnings surprise was 635.7%. In the past 60 days, the Zacks Consensus Estimate for VNCE’s fiscal 2027 earnings has increased 59.5%.
3M NYSE: MMM delivered a beat-and-raise quarter before the market opened on July 21. The initial reaction from investors is bullish, with the stock surging 9% after trading began. The earnings beat was more of the same for a company that’s taken many steps to improve efficiency in the past 12 months. The revenue beat was what investors have been waiting for, making the bear case harder to defend.
3M Today
$170.26 +11.15 (+7.00%)
As of 02:54 PM Eastern
This is a fair market value price provided by Massive. Learn more.
52-Week Range$139.34▼
$177.41Dividend Yield1.83%
P/E Ratio32.82
Price Target$169.43
The best part of the Q2 2026 earnings report may have been the company’s forward guidance. 3M raised its full-year guidance for revenue, earnings per share (EPS) and free cash flow. The estimates for EPS of $8.80 to $8.95 and FCF of $4.7 billion to $4.9 billion would represent growth of around 10% and 20%, respectively. Both of which are ahead of the company’s average over the last few years.
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That’s where the short-term and long-term outlook for MMM diverge. Most formulas model significantly less growth. But averages are backward-looking, which is the core of the issue. MMM stock has surged, but it looks expensive compared to its history. Investors, however, tend to look towards the future.
Industrial and China Demand Powered the Quarter3M's adjusted organic sales grew 5.4% year over year. That growth was concentrated in the parts of the business investors care most about.
Safety and Industrial, the company’s largest segment, posted adjusted organic growth of roughly 8% for the quarter, led by strength in industrial adhesives and tapes and personal safety products.
Transportation and Electronics grew organically by nearly 6%.
The Consumer segment was the lone soft spot, posting a modest organic decline.
That's a familiar pattern for 3M this year: industrial and electronics demand is doing the heavy lifting while its consumer division stays sluggish.
Geographically, China stood out. Adjusted organic sales grew by double digits for the quarter. That’s meaningful given how much of the bear case on industrials this year has hinged on weakness in China demand. If that strength holds, it undercuts one of the more persistent worries about 3M's growth runway.
Adjusted operating margin expanded 40 basis points to 24.9%. That continues a trend of efficiency gains that management has been building toward for several quarters. It's not a dramatic jump, but consistency here matters more than a single big number.
3M also used the report to highlight a handful of partnerships aimed at newer growth areas: a deal with Microsoft Corp. NASDAQ: MSFT to deploy 3M's optical technology in AI data centers, a long-term agreement with Airbus on aircraft insulation, and an AI-powered customer service tool called Ask 3M. None of these will move the needle on this quarter's numbers, but they're the kind of forward-looking additions management likes to point to when making the case that 3M is more than a legacy industrial name.
3M Is Rebuilding Its Dividend After the 2024 Cut3M cut its dividend in 2024 after spinning off its healthcare business. That was a bigger story than having the payout cut in half. 3M was a Dividend King, a title that made MMM a set-it-and-forget-it choice for income investors.
Many of those investors walked away from 3M after the cut. But the company has been taking steps to win those investors back. The company increased its dividend in 2025 and again in February. The payout of 78 cents per share is well below the pre-cut level of $1.51, but it’s up more than 10% from the post-cut level of 70 cents per share.
MMM Stock Tests Key Resistance After Earnings Breakout3M's chart tells two stories at once, and today's earnings reaction is forcing them to collide. MMM has spent the last three months in a textbook ascending channel. That can be seen with higher lows in May, higher lows again in June, and now a fresh push toward the top of that channel. That's the bullish structure. Buyers have been in control since the April low near $145.
But zoom out further, and MMM has also just completed a round trip. The post-earnings surge to near $172 puts the stock back at the same level it touched at its February high—the last time it tried this level, it failed and fell nearly 20% into April. That history is why this retest matters more than a typical breakout attempt.
The difference is the catalyst. This earnings breakout is being fueled by a genuinely strong quarter across the board. That's a fundamentally different setup than February's failed breakout, which happened without a comparable catalyst. This time, buyers have a reason to defend the highs.
RSI Signals Overbought Conditions, But the Trend Remains BullishThe RSI reading of 70 puts MMM squarely in overbought territory, and the stock is trading well above its 50-day moving average near $156. That gap between price and trend typically resolves one of two ways: a sideways digestion, or a pullback toward the moving average.
Neither outcome breaks the bullish structure. A pullback that holds above the channel's rising trendline, likely in the $160-$165 zone, would reinforce the higher-lows pattern rather than undermine it. That's the healthiest version of "overbought": a pause that resets momentum without giving back the structural gains.
Will Analyst Upgrades Keep 3M Stock Moving Higher?Overall MarketRank™75th Percentile
Analyst RatingHold
Upside/Downside2.3% Downside
Short Interest LevelHealthy
Dividend StrengthModerate
News Sentiment0.34 Insider TradingN/A
Proj. Earnings Growth7.55%
See Full Analysis
Overall, this was a good quarter for 3M, but a lot of the company’s growth appears to be priced in. Investors looking to get involved may want to wait for a better entry point, which could come in the days following the earnings report.
That said, overbought readings after an 8% gap almost always cool off. The real question is whether Wall Street analysts follow the earnings beat with upgraded price targets. The post-earnings spike has pushed MMM slightly above its consensus price target of $169.43.
Sell-side re-ratings, not chart patterns, are usually what turn a one-day earnings pop into a sustained re-rating of the stock. Until that happens, this breakout is unconfirmed, resting on a single catalyst rather than a broader shift in how the Street values 3M.
Should You Invest $1,000 in 3M Right Now?Before you consider 3M, you'll want to hear this.
MarketBeat keeps track of Wall Street's top-rated and best performing research analysts and the stocks they recommend to their clients on a daily basis. MarketBeat has identified the five stocks that top analysts are quietly whispering to their clients to buy now before the broader market catches on... and 3M wasn't on the list.
While 3M currently has a Hold rating among analysts, top-rated analysts believe these five stocks are better buys.
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Tesla, Nvidia, and Google helped shape the last era of market growth, but the next wave could come from a new group of companies. Inside this report, you’ll find 7 stocks that could play a major role in the next tech-driven market boom.
3M Company (MMM) Q2 2026 Earnings Call July 21, 2026 9:00 AM EDT
Company Participants
Chinmay Trivedi - Senior Vice President of Investor Relations and Financial Planning & Analysis
William Brown - CEO & Chairman
Anurag Maheshwari - CFO & Executive VP
Conference Call Participants
Jeffrey Sprague - Vertical Research Partners, LLC
Scott Davis - Melius Research LLC
Amit Mehrotra - UBS Investment Bank, Research Division
Nigel Coe - Wolfe Research, LLC
Chigusa Katoku - JPMorgan Chase & Co, Research Division
Christopher Snyder - Morgan Stanley, Research Division
Nicole DeBlase - Deutsche Bank AG, Research Division
Piyush Avasthy - Citigroup Inc., Research Division
Deane Dray - RBC Capital Markets, Research Division
Brett Linzey - Mizuho Securities USA LLC, Research Division
Laurence Alexander - Jefferies LLC, Research Division
Presentation
Operator
Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for standing by. Welcome to the 3M Second Quarter Earnings Conference Call. [Operator Instructions]
As a reminder, this call is being recorded Tuesday, July 21, 2026. I would now like to turn the call over to Chinmay Trivedi, Senior Vice President of Investor Relations and Financial Planning and Analysis at 3M.
Chinmay Trivedi
Senior Vice President of Investor Relations and Financial Planning & Analysis
Thank you. Good morning, everyone, and welcome to our quarterly earnings conference call. With me today are Bill Brown, 3M's Chairman and Chief Executive Officer; and Anurag Maheshwari, 3M's Chief Financial Officer. Bill and Anurag will make some formal comments, then we will take your questions. Please note that today's earnings release and slide presentation accompanying this call are posted on the homepage of our Investor Relations website at 3m.com.
Please turn to Slide 2 and take a moment to read the forward-looking statements. During today's conference call, we'll be making certain predictive statements that reflect our current views about 3M's future performance and financial results. These statements are based on certain assumptions and expectations
U.S. stocks traded higher midway through trading, with the Dow Jones index gaining over 350 points on Tuesday.
The Dow traded up 0.70% to 52,204.49 while the NASDAQ climbed 1.30% to 25,838.45. The S&P 500 also rose, gaining, 0.82% to 7,504.18.
Leading and Lagging Sectors
Information technology shares jumped by 2% on Tuesday.
In trading on Tuesday, consumer staples stocks fell by 0.9%.
Top Headline
3M Company (NYSE:MMM) shares jumped over 9% on Tuesday after the company reported better-than-expected second-quarter results and raised its full-year guidance.
The company posted adjusted earnings of $2.40 per share, beating the analyst consensus estimate of $2.25. Revenue rose 2.4% year over year to $6.50 billion, topping expectations of $6.41 billion.
Equities Trading UP
Equities Trading DOWN
Commodities
In commodity news, oil traded up 2.1% to $84.97 while gold traded up 1.4% at $4,071.30.
Silver traded up 3.9% to $59.290 on Tuesday, while copper rose 2.8% to $6.5200.
Euro zone
European shares were mostly higher today. The eurozone’s STOXX 600 rose 0.3%, while Spain’s IBEX 35 Index rose 0.6% London’s FTSE 100 rose 0.5%, Germany’s DAX gained 0.3%, while France’s CAC 40 slipped 0.1%.
Asia Pacific Markets
Asian markets closed mixed on Tuesday, with Japan’s Nikkei 225 gaining 3.26%, Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index falling 0.04%, China’s Shanghai Composite rising 1.79% and India’s BSE Sensex falling 0.31%.
Economics
U.S. Redbook Index rose by 7.8% year-over-year in the week ending July 18.
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Billionaire investor Warren Buffett once said that "the single most important decision in evaluating a business is pricing power," and that "if you've got the power to raise prices without losing business to a competitor, you've got a very good business."
For Buffett, that's a sign of a strong competitive advantage, or moat. If prices don't dissuade customers, that symbolizes strong brand loyalty, perhaps even a necessity that consumers can't do without. Three stocks with plenty of pricing power and that can make for good long-term investments are Coca-Cola (KO +0.00%), Apple (AAPL +0.50%), and Netflix (NFLX +0.16%).
Image source: Getty Images.
Coca-Cola Buffett is a big fan of Coca-Cola, and it's his go-to beverage, once admitting that one-quarter of his daily calories are from Coca-Cola products. Buffett and many other Coca-Cola loyalists may not want to pay more for the company's products, but would grudgingly do so if the company raised prices.
The company did have to hike prices amid inflation in recent years, and that didn't have a devastating impact on its business at all. Sales and profits have continued to grow for Coca-Cola, and its margins are as solid as ever, with the company reporting $13.7 billion in profit over its past four quarters on revenue of $49.2 billion, which means roughly 28 cents of every dollar of revenue makes it through to the bottom line.
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Coca-Cola's robust business generates modest growth, but it's sufficient to enable the company to reinvest in its operations and also grow its dividend, which it has for decades. And with an above-average yield of 2.6%, it can be a safe-haven investment that dividend investors can comfortably hold in their portfolios for decades.
Apple Top tech giant, Apple, is another company that can afford to increase prices and still do well. That's because its iconic iPhones are a bit of a status symbol that consumers are willing to pay more for. And once they're within Apple's vast ecosystem, it's hard for consumers to readjust their entire digital lives and profiles to fit a different one, even if they wanted to. Thus, there's a costly, time-consuming barrier that deters many Apple customers from switching. It may not be impossible, but it's certainly not easy.
Buffett is a fan of Apple, once referring to it as "probably the best business I know in the world." Despite a lack of innovation over the years, besides just making modest changes to its iPhones, consumers continue to buy and upgrade their devices even as prices rise higher. Meanwhile, Apple has also been expanding its services business so that it can still make money off its existing users even if they aren't buying new phones or tablets every year.
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Apple may not be the leader in artificial intelligence, and it's been criticized for being a bit of a laggard in that space, but that hasn't hurt the tech stock, which is among the most valuable in the world, with a market cap of around $4.8 trillion.
Netflix The only stock on this list Buffett hasn't bought is Netflix, but it fits the mold of the others listed here. It generates strong margins, is a leader in its industry, and has been able to raise prices without much impact on demand.
If Buffett were more comfortable with streaming stocks, Netflix is one that I believe he'd buy for its dominant market position. While consumers may have become frustrated with the streaming company's price increases over the years, it still offers a fairly attractive value proposition, with plans of around $20 that provide access to a wide range of movies and TV shows. It also has a lower-priced option with ads that can appeal to consumers on tighter budgets.
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The company has generated strong growth in recent years, as price hikes have helped rather than hurt the business. Last year, the company's profit totaled $11 billion, a little more than double the $5.4 billion it reported two years earlier.
Both funds track 400+ financial stocks with nearly identical sector weights. VFH offers a larger asset base and slightly higher yield, while FNCL charges a lower expense ratio.
Delta Air Lines (DAL - Free Report) appears an attractive pick, as it has been recently upgraded to a Zacks Rank #2 (Buy). This rating change essentially reflects an upward trend in earnings estimates -- one of the most powerful forces impacting stock prices.
The Zacks rating relies solely on a company's changing earnings picture. It tracks EPS estimates for the current and following years from the sell-side analysts covering the stock through a consensus measure -- the Zacks Consensus Estimate.
Since a changing earnings picture is a powerful factor influencing near-term stock price movements, the Zacks rating system is very useful for individual investors. They may find it difficult to make decisions based on rating upgrades by Wall Street analysts, as these are mostly driven by subjective factors that are hard to see and measure in real time.
As such, the Zacks rating upgrade for Delta is essentially a positive comment on its earnings outlook that could have a favorable impact on its stock price.
Most Powerful Force Impacting Stock PricesThe change in a company's future earnings potential, as reflected in earnings estimate revisions, has proven to be strongly correlated with the near-term price movement of its stock. That's partly because of the influence of institutional investors that use earnings and earnings estimates for calculating the fair value of a company's shares. An increase or decrease in earnings estimates in their valuation models simply results in higher or lower fair value for a stock, and institutional investors typically buy or sell it. Their transaction of large amounts of shares then leads to price movement for the stock.
For Delta, rising earnings estimates and the consequent rating upgrade fundamentally mean an improvement in the company's underlying business. And investors' appreciation of this improving business trend should push the stock higher.
Harnessing the Power of Earnings Estimate RevisionsAs empirical research shows a strong correlation between trends in earnings estimate revisions and near-term stock movements, tracking such revisions for making an investment decision could be truly rewarding. Here is where the tried-and-tested Zacks Rank stock-rating system plays an important role, as it effectively harnesses the power of earnings estimate revisions.
The Zacks Rank stock-rating system, which uses four factors related to earnings estimates to classify stocks into five groups, ranging from Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy) to Zacks Rank #5 (Strong Sell), has an impressive externally-audited track record, with Zacks Rank #1 stocks generating an average annual return of +25% since 1988. You can see the complete list of today's Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here >>>> .
Earnings Estimate Revisions for DeltaFor the fiscal year ending December 2026, this airline is expected to earn $6.66 per share, which is unchanged compared with the year-ago reported number.
Analysts have been steadily raising their estimates for Delta. Over the past three months, the Zacks Consensus Estimate for the company has increased 31%.
Bottom LineUnlike the overly optimistic Wall Street analysts whose rating systems tend to be weighted toward favorable recommendations, the Zacks rating system maintains an equal proportion of "buy" and "sell" ratings for its entire universe of more than 4,000 stocks at any point in time. Irrespective of market conditions, only the top 5% of the Zacks-covered stocks get a "Strong Buy" rating and the next 15% get a "Buy" rating. So, the placement of a stock in the top 20% of the Zacks-covered stocks indicates its superior earnings estimate revision feature, making it a solid candidate for producing market-beating returns in the near term.
You can learn more about the Zacks Rank here >>>
The upgrade of Delta to a Zacks Rank #2 positions it in the top 20% of the Zacks-covered stocks in terms of estimate revisions, implying that the stock might move higher in the near term.
SPRING, Texas--(BUSINESS WIRE)--ExxonMobil Holdings Corporation (NYSE: XOM) will release its second quarter 2026 financial results on Friday, July 31, 2026. The company will issue a press release via Business Wire that will be available at 5:30 a.m. CT at investor.exxonmobil.com. Darren Woods, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer; Neil Hansen, Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer; and Jim Chapman, Vice President, Corporate Finance and Treasurer, will review the results during a liv.
Marley Kayden discusses General Motors' (GM) latest earnings as shares rally on a beat and raise quarter. She says consumer demand in North America remains strong even as tariffs and an unclear geopolitical backdrop pose last challenges.
General Motors Company (GM) Q2 2026 Earnings Call July 21, 2026 8:30 AM EDT
Company Participants
Ashish Kohli - Vice President of Investor Relations
Mary Barra - Chairman & CEO
Paul Jacobson - Executive VP & CFO
Conference Call Participants
Joseph Spak - UBS Investment Bank, Research Division
Dan Levy - Barclays Bank PLC, Research Division
Andrew Percoco - Morgan Stanley, Research Division
Itay Michaeli - TD Cowen, Research Division
Michael Ward - Citigroup Inc., Research Division
Emmanuel Rosner - Wolfe Research, LLC
Gautam Narayan - RBC Capital Markets, Research Division
Mark Delaney - Goldman Sachs Group, Inc., Research Division
Rajat Gupta - JPMorgan Chase & Co, Research Division
Presentation
Operator
Good morning, and welcome to the General Motors Company Second Quarter 2026 Earnings Conference Call.
[Operator Instructions] As a reminder, this conference call is being recorded, Tuesday, July 21, 2026. I would now like to turn the conference over to Ashish Kohli, GM's Vice President of Investor Relations.
Ashish Kohli
Vice President of Investor Relations
Thanks, Julie, and good morning, everyone. We appreciate you joining us as we review GM's financial results for the second quarter of 2026. Our conference call materials were issued this morning and are available on GM's Investor Relations website. We are also broadcasting this call via webcast.
Joining us today are Mary Barra, GM's Chair and CEO; along with Paul Jacobson, GM's Executive Vice President and CFO. Susan Sheffield, President and CEO of GM Financial, will also be joining us for the Q&A portion.
On today's call, management will make forward-looking statements about our expectations. These statements are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially. These risks and uncertainties include the factors identified in our filings with the SEC. Please review the safe harbor statement on the first page of our presentation as the content of this call will be
Goldman Sachs has created a new platform to expand its offerings for wealthy clients and family offices who increasingly want direct stakes in fast-growing private companies, CNBC has learned.
The new group, called the alternative investments platform, combines Goldman's existing alternatives business with two newly established teams, according to a memo seen first by CNBC.
The new teams focus on direct investments in individual private companies, rather than broader private equity funds, and on helping clients buy and sell those stakes, according to the memo.
"There has been a lot of focus on the big growth tech names and getting clients access to those before they debut in the public markets," Kristin Olson, Goldman Sachs' global head of alternatives for wealth, told CNBC in an interview.
Goldman's move reflects two of the biggest trends reshaping Wall Street. The firm has spent years pushing deeper into wealth and asset management because of its perception as providing steadier revenues than investment banking and trading. At the same time, the most successful startups are staying private far longer than they once did, allowing early investors to capture most of the gains before public investors get a chance.
"Companies are going public at a trillion dollars," Olson said. "If you haven't participated along the way, you're clearly missing a big part of the growth cycle."
AI boomGoldman has been arranging direct investments in later-stage private companies for wealthy clients for roughly two decades, Olson said, pointing to Facebook before its 2012 IPO and later SpaceX, Stripe and Canva. But growth in demand for the asset class convinced executives to break out the business, she added.
The firm's goal, Olson said, is to help clients identify promising companies before they become household names.
Rather than targeting early-stage startups, Olson said Goldman generally focuses on later-stage companies that have established products, meaningful revenue and clearer paths toward profitability, seeking what she described as a "sweet spot" between risk and return.
The AI investment boom has only intensified demand. Beyond leading model developers, Goldman is increasingly steering clients toward investments in the infrastructure underpinning AI, including data centers and related projects, Olson said.
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The announcement comes days after Goldman reported record quarterly revenue, with executives highlighting AI-driven activity across investment banking, trading and financing businesses. The results reinforced investors' view that Goldman is positioned to benefit from multiple facets of the AI investment cycle.
The announcement also formalizes Goldman's growing business helping clients find liquidity for private investments.
Through its new secondary advisory group, the firm plans to expand a marketplace that allows clients to buy and sell private holdings while also advising clients looking to exit investments held outside Goldman.
"We said, let's break that out and let's make it very clearly defined as something that we're leaning into," Olson said.
Google’s reported next-generation AI chip, however, suggests there may be another way to attack the problem.
Google’s AI Bet Isn’t Just About Faster ChipsAccording to a CNBC report citing The Information, Google is developing an AI chip known internally as Frozen v2, designed to permanently embed parts of its Gemini AI model directly into the silicon.
Unlike conventional AI accelerators that rely primarily on software to run increasingly large models, Frozen v2 aims to integrate portions of the model into the hardware itself, improving inference efficiency while reducing the computing resources required to perform AI tasks.
The objective isn’t simply to make AI faster. It’s to make AI more efficient.
That distinction matters as hyperscalers race to build ever-larger AI infrastructure.
The AI Race May Become A Power RaceChina is currently building roughly 100 gigawatts of nuclear capacity and nearly 100 gigawatts of solar generation, investments Fink says are laying the foundation for the country’s AI ambitions. If electricity becomes the industry’s primary bottleneck, simply deploying more GPUs may no longer be enough.
That’s where Google’s reported chip strategy becomes particularly interesting.
Instead of solving the problem by generating more power, Google appears to be exploring how to accomplish more AI work with each watt of electricity consumed. If Frozen v2 delivers meaningful improvements in performance per watt, it could complement—not replace—the industry’s massive investments in data centers and power infrastructure.
Alphabet’s earnings will almost certainly focus on AI spending and cloud demand. But investors may want to listen for something else: whether the company is talking as much about AI efficiency as it is about AI scale.
If Fink is correct, the next contest in AI won’t simply be over who builds the biggest models—it will be over who can power them most efficiently.
Photo: Photo Agency/Shutterstock
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Have you been searching for a stock that might be well-positioned to maintain its earnings-beat streak in its upcoming report? It is worth considering Hilton Worldwide Holdings Inc. (HLT - Free Report) , which belongs to the Zacks Hotels and Motels industry.
This company has seen a nice streak of beating earnings estimates, especially when looking at the previous two reports. The average surprise for the last two quarters was 3.28%.
For the most recent quarter, Hilton Worldwide was expected to post earnings of $1.96 per share, but it reported $2.01 per share instead, representing a surprise of 2.55%. For the previous quarter, the consensus estimate was $2 per share, while it actually produced $2.08 per share, a surprise of 4.00%.
Price and EPS Surprise
For Hilton Worldwide, estimates have been trending higher, thanks in part to this earnings surprise history. And when you look at the stock's positive Zacks Earnings ESP (Expected Surprise Prediction), it's a great indicator of a future earnings beat, especially when combined with its solid Zacks Rank.
Our research shows that stocks with the combination of a positive Earnings ESP and a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold) or better produce a positive surprise nearly 70% of the time. In other words, if you have 10 stocks with this combination, the number of stocks that beat the consensus estimate could be as high as seven.
The Zacks Earnings ESP compares the Most Accurate Estimate to the Zacks Consensus Estimate for the quarter; the Most Accurate Estimate is a version of the Zacks Consensus whose definition is related to change. 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.
Hilton Worldwide has an Earnings ESP of +1.54% at the moment, suggesting that analysts have grown bullish on its near-term earnings potential. When you combine this positive Earnings ESP with the stock's Zacks Rank #3 (Hold), it shows that another beat is possibly around the corner. The company's next earnings report is expected to be released on July 28, 2026.
Investors should note, however, that a negative Earnings ESP reading is not indicative of an earnings miss, but a negative value does reduce the predictive power of this metric.
Many companies end up beating the consensus EPS estimate, though this is not the only reason why their shares gain. Additionally, some stocks may remain stable even if they end up missing the consensus estimate.
Because of this, it's really important to check a company's Earnings ESP ahead of its quarterly release to increase the odds of success. Make sure to utilize our Earnings ESP Filter to uncover the best stocks to buy or sell before they've reported.
Even as Stripe and Advent seek to buy PayPal (PYPL) for a price that matches the company's current market cap, Owen Lau of Clear Street still has a hold rating for the stock. He discusses PayPal's strategic crossroads and how new leadership can affect the fintech firm.
I believe Intel Corporation CEO Tan is executing the turnaround quite well. Datacenter, ASICs, and 18A all look better, and the stock reflects that. That's precisely the problem. I now see a real INTC turnaround priced as though the hard part is already done. At 87x forward earnings, there is little room for error. Consensus for Q2 sits just above Intel's own guide. After seven straight revenue beats, simply landing near the midpoint is unlikely to be enough.
NEW YORK, July 21, 2026 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Pomerantz LLP is investigating claims on behalf of investors of Hertz Global Holdings (“Hertz” or the “Company”) (NASDAQ: HTZ). Such investors are advised to contact Danielle Peyton at [email protected] or 646-581-9980, ext. 7980.
The investigation concerns whether Hertz and certain of its officers and/or directors have engaged in securities fraud or other unlawful business practices.
[Click here for information about joining the class action]
On June 24, 2026, Hertz issued a press release “announc[ing] that its wholly-owned indirect subsidiary, The Hertz Corporation (‘Hertz Corp.’), intends to offer, subject to market and other conditions, $300 million in aggregate principal amount of Exchangeable Senior First-Lien Secured PIK Notes due 2030 (the ‘Notes’) in a private offering to persons reasonably believed to be qualified institutional buyers[.]” The press release specified that “Hertz Corp. intends to use the net proceeds received from the offering of the Notes for general corporate purposes, which may include the repayment of outstanding indebtedness.”
On this news, Hertz’s stock price fell $2.06 per share, or 40.71%, to close at $3.00 per share on June 24, 2026.
Pomerantz LLP, with offices in New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, London, Paris, and Tel Aviv, is acknowledged as one of the premier firms in the areas of corporate, securities, and antitrust class litigation. Founded by the late Abraham L. Pomerantz, known as the dean of the class action bar, Pomerantz pioneered the field of securities class actions. Today, more than 85 years later, Pomerantz continues in the tradition he established, fighting for the rights of the victims of securities fraud, breaches of fiduciary duty, and corporate misconduct. The Firm has recovered numerous multimillion-dollar damages awards on behalf of class members. See www.pomlaw.com.
Attorney advertising. Prior results do not guarantee similar outcomes.
NEW YORK, July 21, 2026 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Pomerantz LLP is investigating claims on behalf of investors of International Business Machines Corporation (“IBM” or the “Company”) (NYSE: IBM). Such investors are advised to contact Danielle Peyton at [email protected] or 646-581-9980, ext. 7980.
The investigation concerns whether IBM and certain of its officers and/or directors have engaged in securities fraud or other unlawful business practices.
[Click here for information about joining the class action]
On July 14, 2026, IBM released its financial results for the second quarter of 2026. IBM announced a disappointing quarter that it attributed to “a shortfall in our Z performance and the associated software stack, primarily in Transaction Processing.” IBM also disclosed that it had “faltered,” and “did not adapt and move quickly enough” so that “numerous large deals failed to close on the timelines we expected, driving the majority of our shortfall.”
On this news, IBM’s stock price fell $73.16 per share, or 25.21%, to close at $217.07 per share on July 14, 2026.
Pomerantz LLP, with offices in New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, London, Paris, and Tel Aviv, is acknowledged as one of the premier firms in the areas of corporate, securities, and antitrust class litigation. Founded by the late Abraham L. Pomerantz, known as the dean of the class action bar, Pomerantz pioneered the field of securities class actions. Today, more than 85 years later, Pomerantz continues in the tradition he established, fighting for the rights of the victims of securities fraud, breaches of fiduciary duty, and corporate misconduct. The Firm has recovered numerous multimillion-dollar damages awards on behalf of class members. See www.pomlaw.com.
Attorney advertising. Prior results do not guarantee similar outcomes.
UnitedHealth Group (UNH - Free Report) could be a solid choice for investors given its recent upgrade to a Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy). An upward trend in earnings estimates -- one of the most powerful forces impacting stock prices -- has triggered this rating change.
The Zacks rating relies solely on a company's changing earnings picture. It tracks EPS estimates for the current and following years from the sell-side analysts covering the stock through a consensus measure -- the Zacks Consensus Estimate.
Individual investors often find it hard to make decisions based on rating upgrades by Wall Street analysts, since these are mostly driven by subjective factors that are hard to see and measure in real time. In these situations, the Zacks rating system comes in handy because of the power of a changing earnings picture in determining near-term stock price movements.
As such, the Zacks rating upgrade for UnitedHealth is essentially a positive comment on its earnings outlook that could have a favorable impact on its stock price.
Most Powerful Force Impacting Stock PricesThe change in a company's future earnings potential, as reflected in earnings estimate revisions, has proven to be strongly correlated with the near-term price movement of its stock. That's partly because of the influence of institutional investors that use earnings and earnings estimates for calculating the fair value of a company's shares. An increase or decrease in earnings estimates in their valuation models simply results in higher or lower fair value for a stock, and institutional investors typically buy or sell it. Their bulk investment action then leads to price movement for the stock.
Fundamentally speaking, rising earnings estimates and the consequent rating upgrade for UnitedHealth imply an improvement in the company's underlying business. Investors should show their appreciation for this improving business trend by pushing the stock higher.
Harnessing the Power of Earnings Estimate RevisionsEmpirical research shows a strong correlation between trends in earnings estimate revisions and near-term stock movements, so it could be truly rewarding if such revisions are tracked for making an investment decision. Here is where the tried-and-tested Zacks Rank stock-rating system plays an important role, as it effectively harnesses the power of earnings estimate revisions.
The Zacks Rank stock-rating system, which uses four factors related to earnings estimates to classify stocks into five groups, ranging from Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy) to Zacks Rank #5 (Strong Sell), has an impressive externally-audited track record, with Zacks Rank #1 stocks generating an average annual return of +25% since 1988. You can see the complete list of today's Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here >>>> .
Earnings Estimate Revisions for UnitedHealthFor the fiscal year ending December 2026, this largest U.S. health insurer is expected to earn $19.04 per share, which is unchanged compared with the year-ago reported number.
Analysts have been steadily raising their estimates for UnitedHealth. Over the past three months, the Zacks Consensus Estimate for the company has increased 7%.
Bottom LineUnlike the overly optimistic Wall Street analysts whose rating systems tend to be weighted toward favorable recommendations, the Zacks rating system maintains an equal proportion of "buy" and "sell" ratings for its entire universe of more than 4,000 stocks at any point in time. Irrespective of market conditions, only the top 5% of the Zacks-covered stocks get a "Strong Buy" rating and the next 15% get a "Buy" rating. So, the placement of a stock in the top 20% of the Zacks-covered stocks indicates its superior earnings estimate revision feature, making it a solid candidate for producing market-beating returns in the near term.
You can learn more about the Zacks Rank here >>>
The upgrade of UnitedHealth to a Zacks Rank #1 positions it in the top 5% of the Zacks-covered stocks in terms of estimate revisions, implying that the stock might move higher in the near term.
Goldman Sachs sees a potential return of triple-digit crude prices on the horizon if disruptions to oil flows out of the Strait of Hormuz don’t ease soon. Analysts at the investment bank estimate that Brent crude oil, the global benchmark price, could top $120 a barrel next quarter and average more than $100 a barrel next year if that key waterway remains disrupted. The recent increase in hostilities between the U.S. and Iran has already driven Brent up over $90 a barrel, a roughly 30% surge from its recent bottom in the low $70s, when it appeared that the two sides had a deal to end hostilities and reopen the Strait.
Here’s a look at the investment bank’s current oil price scenarios and what they mean for oil stocks.
Image source: Getty Images.
Two paths for oil pricesAnalysts at Goldman Sachs recently published a note outlining their outlook for crude prices. The base case is that Brent will average $80 a barrel in the fourth quarter of 2026 and be around $75 next year. This outlook assumes that there’s a de-escalation in hostilities between the U.S. and Iran before the end of this year. Despite recent attacks by both sides, there’s renewed hope that they could take steps to de-escalate the current conflict. Several news outlets recently reported that mediators presented a proposal to Iran that included a 10-day ceasefire to revive peace talks between the countries.
However, while de-escalation is Goldman Sachs’ base case, it now sees upside price risks. Oil flows out of that key waterway have nearly stopped since the recent resurgence in fighting and have averaged 45% below pre-war levels in the last month, according to Goldman’s estimates. That’s driving the bank’s upside scenario. It sees Brent surging past $120 a barrel by the fourth quarter if the Strait remains disrupted. Meanwhile, it sees crude averaging $100 a barrel next year if the disturbance continues throughout 2027, and production in the Persian Gulf doesn’t recover to its pre-war level until the end of the year, when additional oil bypass pipeline capacity comes online.
Oil stocks can thrive in either scenarioGoldman Sachs’ upside scenario for oil prices would be a boon for oil producers. They’d cash in on triple-digit crude prices, enabling them to further strengthen their balance sheets and return more cash to shareholders through higher dividends and share repurchases. However, the bank’s base case for crude prices -- $80 by the fourth quarter and $75 a barrel in 2027 -- is still a great range for oil companies.
For example, Chevron (CVX +0.16%) can thrive at $70 oil. The company initially expected to generate an additional $12.5 billion in free cash flow this year at that oil price point, fueled by its merger with Hess, recently completed expansion projects, and cost-saving initiatives. Given where crude prices have been and Goldman Sachs’ estimates for the rest of this year, Chevron will vastly exceed that projection. Meanwhile, it can grow its free cash flow at a more than 10% annual rate through 2030 at $70 oil, putting it in a position for another strong showing in 2027.
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Fellow oil giant ExxonMobil (XOM +1.80%) can also thrive at lower oil prices. Exxon is in the middle of a multi-year structural cost-savings initiative that has already delivered $15.6 billion in cumulative savings since 2019, with the goal of reaching $20 billion by 2030. The oil giant is also investing heavily in its highest-return, highest-margin assets. These catalysts could add $25 billion in earnings growth and $35 billion in cash flow growth by 2030 at the same prices and margins as 2024. Exxon would produce $145 billion in surplus free cash during this period at $65 Brent. It’s on track to generate a lot more surplus cash over the next year at Goldman’s base case for oil prices.
Even the base case is optimistic for oil stocksGoldman Sachs sees the potential for crude prices to top $120 a barrel next quarter if the U.S. and Iran don’t de-escalate soon. That would enable oil companies like Exxon and Chevron to generate even bigger gushers of excess free cash flow. However, they’d still thrive under its base case. That makes oil stocks compelling investments in the current environment, as they should deliver strong returns in the base case and significant upside in a higher oil price scenario.
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Salesforce (NYSE:CRM | CRM Price Prediction) currently trades at $173.79, while the average Wall Street price target sits at $245.16. That is roughly a 41% implied upside gap.
Salesforce is the world’s largest customer relationship management software provider, repositioning itself around Agentforce, its platform for deploying autonomous AI agents inside enterprise sales, service, and marketing workflows. The AI monetization thesis is either real or it is not, and the 2026 selloff has forced the question.
Analysts have not backed off. Wedbush’s Dan Ives carries a $475 price target that implies roughly 173% upside from here.
A 34% Drawdown in a Rising Market CRM is down 34.05% year to date while the S&P 500 has gained 8.82%. That is violent underperformance for a mega-cap software name despite visibly improving fundamentals.
The catalyst was a slow-motion sector derating. IBM’s July warning about customers reallocating IT budgets toward AI infrastructure was described as a “hammer” slamming down on tech’s AI outsiders, with CRM named directly alongside ServiceNow. The fear is that enterprises are cutting seats on traditional application software to fund GPU spend, putting Salesforce squarely in the crosshairs.
The drawdown is strange given the earnings picture. Q1 FY27 delivered EPS of $3.88 against a $3.13 consensus, revenue of $11.13 billion up 13.3% YoY, and marked the fifth straight quarterly EPS beat. The market sold it anyway.
Why Ives and the Bulls Refuse to Blink The core bull thesis is that Agentforce represents a new subscription tier. Agentforce ARR hit $1.2 billion in Q1 FY27, up 205% YoY, and combined Agentforce plus Data 360 ARR reached roughly $3.4 billion, growing over 200% YoY.
Wedbush’s Dan Ives builds his $475 target on three pillars: Agentforce monetization as a structural upgrade cycle with fully autonomous agents driving high-margin ARR expansion; an unrivaled data moat through Data Cloud, where enterprises are forced to centralize customer data inside Salesforce to make agents functional; and margin expansion combined with re-accelerating growth, arguing the market underestimates how much AI upsell revenue will drop to free cash flow after cost discipline and the $25 billion accelerated buyback that shrank the share count.
Consensus ratings back the direction. Analysts split 6 Strong Buy, 34 Buy, 10 Hold, 0 Sell, and 2 Strong Sell. Management raised FY27 revenue guidance to $45.9 to $46.2 billion and set a $63 billion FY30 revenue target. Insider activity has skewed toward buying, with 55 recent insider transactions net positive. Analyst targets show reiterations and raises, not cuts.
The Software Group Got Hit, But CRM Fell Hardest Among the Cheap Names ServiceNow (NYSE:NOW) is down 31.65% YTD at $104.70, versus a $141.64 average target for roughly 35% upside. Wall Street is bullish (9 Strong Buy, 34 Buy, 4 Hold, 1 Sell), but the multiple stays rich and the AI-capex-crowding-out story hangs over next quarter’s earnings report.
Oracle (NYSE:ORCL) is the outlier. Shares sit at $121.38, down 37.12% YTD, against a $251.85 target implying more than 107% upside. Ratings tilt heavily bullish (8 Strong Buy, 29 Buy, 5 Hold, 1 Sell), but AI-driven capex has turned free cash flow deeply negative.
HubSpot (NYSE:HUBS) trades at $231.26, off 42.38% YTD, with a $275.72 target and modest 19% upside. Recent revisions have skewed negative, including a Wells Fargo downgrade to Equal Weight with a cut from $300 to $225.
The largest analyst-implied upside in this group sits with Oracle on consensus, but CRM’s $475 high-water target is the boldest single call. This is a group derating, and Salesforce has the widest range between consensus and the most bullish voice.
What the Stock Actually Says About Salesforce CRM sits at $173.79 with a consensus target of $245.16, an implied upside of roughly 41%, drawn from a coverage universe of 52 analysts. Trailing P/E is 20x and forward P/E is 13x, unusually cheap for a name growing revenue in the low double digits with 77% gross margins.
Year to date the stock is down 34.05% against the S&P 500’s gain of 8.82%. Over the last month, CRM has clawed back 14.5% while the index slipped 0.62%, hinting that capitulation may be finished.
Where I Land on Salesforce at $173 The bull case works if you believe Agentforce is a real product cycle rather than a marketing wrapper. The fundamentals support that read: five straight EPS beats, ARR compounding at triple digits, buybacks shrinking the float, and a forward P/E in the low teens. The path back to $245 is Agentforce ARR crossing $2 billion, current RPO growth staying in the mid-teens, and one clean quarter that puts the IBM-warning fears to bed.
The bear case works if you think the IBM thesis is correct and enterprises are reallocating software budgets toward GPUs and hyperscaler consumption. In that world, seat-based CRM revenue stalls, Agentforce cannibalizes rather than expands, and the $39.3 billion in noncurrent debt from the buyback becomes a real drag on multiple.
My lean is cautiously long. Ives’ $475 target is aggressive, but consensus at $245 looks reachable inside 12 months if management delivers promised H2 FY27 acceleration. The risk/reward at 13x forward earnings with 200%+ ARR growth in the AI segment is asymmetric enough to matter.
Investors looking for stocks in the Internet - Software sector might want to consider either Salesforce (CRM - Free Report) or Adyen N.V. Unsponsored ADR (ADYEY - Free Report) . But which of these two stocks offers value investors a better bang for their buck right now? We'll need to take a closer look.
There are plenty of strategies for discovering value stocks, but we have found that pairing a strong Zacks Rank with an impressive grade in the Value category of our Style Scores system produces the best returns. The proven Zacks Rank puts an emphasis on earnings estimates and estimate revisions, while our Style Scores work to identify stocks with specific traits.
Right now, Salesforce is sporting a Zacks Rank of #2 (Buy), while Adyen N.V. Unsponsored ADR has a Zacks Rank of #3 (Hold). The Zacks Rank favors stocks that have recently seen positive revisions to their earnings estimates, so investors should rest assured that CRM has an improving earnings outlook. But this is just one factor that value investors are interested in.
Value investors are also interested in a number of tried-and-true valuation metrics that help show when a company is undervalued at its current share price levels.
Our Value category grades stocks based on a number of key metrics, including the tried-and-true P/E ratio, the P/S ratio, earnings yield, and cash flow per share, as well as a variety of other fundamentals that value investors frequently use.
CRM currently has a forward P/E ratio of 12.31, while ADYEY has a forward P/E of 20.82. We also note that CRM has a PEG ratio of 0.68. This popular figure is similar to the widely-used P/E ratio, but the PEG ratio also considers a company's expected EPS growth rate. ADYEY currently has a PEG ratio of 1.25.
Another notable valuation metric for CRM is its P/B ratio of 4.16. The P/B is a method of comparing a stock's market value to its book value, which is defined as total assets minus total liabilities. By comparison, ADYEY has a P/B of 5.48.
These metrics, and several others, help CRM earn a Value grade of B, while ADYEY has been given a Value grade of D.
CRM sticks out from ADYEY in both our Zacks Rank and Style Scores models, so value investors will likely feel that CRM is the better option right now.
