These are this Friday’s top analyst upgrades and downgrades featured by 24/7 Wall St.
Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. (NYSE: BABA) was started as Outperform at BMO Capital Markets, just a day after Barclays gave it the equivalent of a Buy rating as well.
Amazon.com Inc. (NASDAQ: AMZN) was downgraded to Market Perform from Outperform at Cowen. Canaccord Genuity lowered its price target to $310 from $340, Credit Suisse lowered its target to $395 from $422, Oppenheimer lowered its target to $372 from $410 and Topeka lowered its price target to 350 from $395. Our take: Bezos wants to run Amazon like a charity.
GoPro Inc. (NASDAQ: GPRO) was started with an Underperform rating and with a price target of $45 (versus a $79.15 close) at Oppenheimer.
KLA-Tencor Corp. (NASDAQ: KLAC) is planning a huge special dividend and stock buyback under a leveraged recapitalization plan, sending shares up more than 10%. Apparently, that was enough to trigger downgrades as B. Riley lowered the rating to Neutral from Buy and Credit Suisse lowered its rating to Neutral from Outperform.
Microsoft Corp. (NASDAQ: MSFT) was maintained as Outperform and the price target was raised to $55 from $50 at Credit Suisse after earnings. FBR Capital Markets maintained its Outperform rating and raised its target to $53 from $51. Oppenheimer maintained its Outperform rating and $50 price target.
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Other Key Analyst Calls
Abercrombie & Fitch Co. (NYSE: ANF) was downgraded to Market Perform at BMO Capital Markets, and Goldman Sachs also downgraded it to Sell from an already cautious Neutral rating.
American Eagle Outfitters Inc. (NYSE: AEO) was downgraded to Neutral from Buy at Goldman Sachs.
Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. (NASDAQ: CHKP) was raised to Buy from Hold with an $80 price target (versus a $71.00 close) at Needham.
Colfax Corp. (NYSE: CFX) was downgraded to Neutral from Buy at Goldman Sachs.
Halliburton Co. (NYSE: HAL) was raised to Buy from Neutral with a $68 price target (versus a $55.85 close) at Citigroup.
Informatica Corp. (NASDAQ: INFA) was downgraded to Underperform from an already cautious Neutral rating at Bank of America Merrill Lynch, and the price target was cut to $33 from $37 (versus a $32.83 close).
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Kinder Morgan Energy Partners L.P. (NYSE: KMP) was downgraded to Hold from Buy at Argus, but this is ahead of the Kinder Morgan transaction date next month.
Lorillard Inc. (NYSE: LO) was raised to Market Perform from Underperform at Cowen.
Maxim Integrated Products Inc. (NASDAQ: MXIM) was raised to Buy from Hold at Deutsche Bank.
Nabors Industries Ltd. (NYSE: NBR) was raised to Buy with $30 target (versus a $18.99 close) at Argus.
NCR Corp. (NYSE: NCR) was raised to Neutral from Sell with a $26 price target at Goldman Sachs, on the heels of a serious sell-off after its earnings.
Nokia Corp. (NYSE: NOK) was given mixed comments at Bernstein, but Canaccord Genuity raised its price target to $13 from $12 as its long-term growth drivers remain intact.
Premiere Global Services Inc. (NYSE: PGI) was downgraded to Market Perform from Outperform at Raymond James.
Reliance Steel & Aluminum Co. (NYSE: RS) was raised to Buy from Hold but the price target was lowered slightly to $77 from $79 (versus a $63.54 close) at Jefferies.
Weatherford International (NYSE: WFT) was raised to Buy from Neutral with a $23 price target (versus a $16.87 close) at Citigroup.
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In case you missed Thursday’s analyst upgrades and downgrades, they included Alibaba, Angie’s List, Boeing, Yelp, AT&T and a dozen or so more.
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