Investing

Top Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades: Alkermes, Apple, Canada Goose, FireEye, J.Jill, Kraft Heinz, Uber, Vonage and More

Jon C. Ogg

Published: May 31, 2019 9:00 am

Last Updated: January 30, 2020 8:10 pm

Stocks were indicated to open lower by over 250 points on the Dow Jones industrials and 30 points on the S&P 500 after President Trump announced a 5% tariff on goods coming in from Mexico. Investors saw stocks recover marginally on Thursday, but that was after two days of strong selling and those fears of “sell in May and go away” have become harder and harder to ignore in the wake of a U.S.-China trade war and a political climate that is boiling over. Even with all that, all-time highs in the stock market are not that much higher than current prices, even as the inverted yield curve has become more pronounced. Investors need to be considering how they want their portfolios positioned for the rest of 2019 and beyond.

24/7 Wall St. reviews dozens of analyst research reports each day of the week in an effort to find new trading and investing ideas for our readers. Some of these daily analyst reports cover stocks to buy, but other reports cover stocks to sell or to avoid.

Additional commentary and trading data have been added on some of the daily analyst reports. The consensus analyst price targets and other valuation metrics are from the Refinitiv (Thomson Reuters) sell-side research service.

These are the top analyst upgrades, downgrades and initiations seen on Friday, May 31, 2019.

Alkermes PLC (NASDAQ: ALKS) was started with a Neutral rating and assigned a $28 price target (versus a $22.03 prior close, after a 2.1% drop) at H.C. Wainwright. Shares hit a 52-week low of $22.02 on Thursday, and the 52-week high is $51.70.

Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL) was reiterated as Outperform with a $235 price target (versus a $178.30 close) at Wedbush Securities. The firm noted that WWDC is on tap for Cupertino, laying the groundwork for developers. Its report noted: “Besides a trade war between the US/China threatening Apple’s core demand and production capabilities for the coming years, a Supreme Court lawsuit setting the stage for Apple to battle in the courts around its App Store and monopoly swirls, and its most important product cycle in a decade on both the hardware/streaming service front, Apple and Cook do not have too much to worry about heading into the coming months.”

Canada Goose Holdings Inc. (NYSE: GOOS) was raised to Buy from Neutral by Goldman Sachs after the stock took such a huge beating after earnings, but the firm did lower its target to $47 from $65 (versus a $35.44 close) at Goldman Sachs. The stock has a 52-week range of $33.53 to $72.27, and while it closed up 4.5% on Thursday, this was a $49 stock prior to the earnings disappointment causing its worst one-day drop since coming public.

Century Communities Inc. (NYSE: CCS) was raised to Outperform from Neutral and the price target was raised to $33 from $29 (versus a $26.58 close) at Wedbush.

Fate Therapeutics Inc. (NASDAQ: FATE) was initiated with a Buy rating and assigned a $25 target price (versus a $19.94 close) at Guggenheim.

FireEye Inc. (NASDAQ: FEYE) was assumed as Neutral with a $17 price target (versus a $15.10 close) at Wedbush. While the rating and target are not that high, the firm did note that FireEye has made good progress stabilizing its financials amidst the rapid market evolution to cloud and advanced threat traction by firewall vendors. While margins are improving, they are still below scale and getting up to solid double-digit growth remains elusive.

J.Jill Inc. (NASDAQ: JILL) was downgraded to Hold from Buy at Deutsche Bank, a day after its shares fell 53% to $1.68 after earnings and sales disappointed.

Kraft Heinz Co. (NASDAQ: KHC) was raised to Neutral from Underweight with a $31 price target (versus a $27.40, after a 3.1% drop) at Piper Jaffray. Kraft Heinz also took a big cut from Credit Suisse the prior day.

Mallinckrodt PLC (NYSE: MNK) was downgraded to Neutral from Overweight at Piper Jaffray.

Rogers Corp. (NYSE: ROG) was started with a Buy rating and assigned a $200 price target (versus a $139.61 close, after a 2.1% gain) at Stifel.

SINA Corp. (NASDAQ: SINA) was raised to Buy from Neutral at Goldman Sachs.

Terex Corp. (NYSE: TEX) was downgraded to In-Line from Outperform at Evercore ISI.

Uber Technologies Inc. (NYSE: UBER) was raised to Overweight from Neutral at Atlantic Equities. Uber was last seen trading up 2.3% at $40.72 after earnings, in a post-IPO range of $36.08 to $45.00.

Vonage Holdings Corp. (NASDAQ: VG) was initiated as Buy and assigned a $15 target price (versus an $11.71 close) at Jefferies.

Waitr Holdings Inc. (NASDAQ: WTRH) was initiated with an Overweight rating and assigned a target price of $11 (versus a $6.74 close) at Piper Jaffray. Its 52-week range is $6.58 to $15.06.

Thursday’s top analyst upgrades and downgrades included Apple, Citigroup, Comcast, Cypress Semiconductor, Huya, Six Flags, Tesla, Teva Pharmaceutical, U.S. Steel, Verizon Communications, Zynga and many more.