(This is CNBC Pro’s live coverage of Wednesday analyst calls and Wall Street chatter. Please refresh every 20-30 minutes to view the latest posts.) Alphabet and a Chinese electric vehicle maker were among the names being talked about by analysts on Wednesday. Analysts reacted positively to Alphabet’s AI-related announcement at a developer conference. Meanwhile, JPMorgan upgraded Nio to neutral from underweight. Check out the latest calls and chatter below. All times ET. 7:41 a.m.: Deutsche steps to the sidelines on Accenture Accenture isn’t benefiting from the generative AI boom, and uncertainty on the long-term impact of the technology will pressure the company’s valuation, according to Deutsche Bank. Deutsche downgraded shares to hold from buy, citing a weak outlook amid a weakened outlook on the IT services sector. “Our channel checks suggest that Gen AI will not be a catalyst for outsized revenue growth for ACN over the near/medium-term and is causing disruption to existing pricing structures,” analyst Bryan Keane wrote in a Tuesday note. “We expect the debate on if Gen AI could be a negative for IT Services vendors to continue to weigh on industry multiples and believe ACN’s valuation could potentially trend back towards a lower, more normalized historical NTM P/E multiple,” he added. Keane lowered his price target to $295 from $409, which is nearly 4% below where shares closed on Tuesday. — Hakyung Kim 7:37 a.m.: SunPower should ‘come back to reality’ following meme mania resurgence, Wolfe says Wolfe Research is cautious on the recent run-up in SunPower . Analyst Steve Fleishman downgraded the solar stock to underperform from peer perform. Fleishman’s $2 price tag reflects a 54.4% downside from Tuesday’s close. Fleishman cited concerns about the reignition of the meme stock hysteria this week that has appeared to send the stock on a tear without a catalyst. Shares have soared more than 90% week to date. “SPWR is the most extreme example of the meme stock resurgence within Clean Tech with the stock up ~100% WTD on a massive short squeeze despite no positive fundamental updates,” Fleishman wrote to clients. “We expect the stock to come back to reality once the squeeze pressure abates.” Shares tumbled more than 20% in premarket trading. Despite this week’s rally, the stock is still down more than 9% on the year. — Alex Harring 7:33 a.m.: TD Cowen upgrades TKO Group to buy from hold Sports entertainment company TKO Group looks undervalued given its strong revenue outlook, according to TD Cowen. Analyst Lance Vitanza upgraded the parent company of WWE and UFC to buy from hold, saying in a note to clients that it was the best value option to invest in sports. “While we appreciate the strength of the Formula One brand as well as its own compelling growth opportunity, trading levels suggest considerable upside to TKO’s multiple over time, in our opinion,” the note said. The company could also get a boost when it gets a new media rights deal for UFC. “With ~70% of revenue under contract, downside risk to our projections appears reasonably well-contained. At the same time, recent and upcoming media rights renewals suggest a substantial uptick in revenue is likely in each of FY25 and FY26,” the note said. Vitanza hiked the price target on TKO to $127 per share from $92. That is nearly 25% above where the stock closed Tuesday. — Jesse Pound 7:13 a.m.: Morgan Stanley raises Dell price target on increased AI demand Stronger-than-expected demand for artificial intelligence products is pushing Morgan Stanley to raise its outlook on Dell . “Our customer and supply chain checks suggests DELL’s AI server and storage businesses are seeing more momentum than we had previously assumed,” analyst Erik Woodring said. His $152 price target, up from $128, is a fresh Wall Street high for Dell stock and implies more than 13% upside from Tuesday’s $134.12 close. Woodring maintains an overweight rating on Dell stock. “DELL remains the Top Pick in our IT Hardware coverage, with Dell Technologies World (May 20-23), F1Q Earnings (May 30th), Computex (June 3-7), and future S & P 500 inclusion (TBD) all upcoming catalysts,” he added. Shares have surged more than 75% in 2024. — Brian Evans 6:38 a.m.: Deutsche Bank downgrades Six Flags Entertainment in ‘mechanical’ move There isn’t much upside left in Six Flags at the moment. Deutsche Bank analyst Chris Woronka lowered his rating on Six Flags to hold from buy and lowered his price target to $27 from $29, implying upside of just 1%. Six Flags said in November 2023 the company would merge with Cedar Fair, with shareholders in the latter entity controlling the majority stake in the new company. “Although we continue to have confidence that the planned merger with FUN will be consummated, Buy-rated FUN (the surviving entity, in a new C-Corp structure in this otherwise merger of equals) is our preferred way to gain access to the anticipated benefits of the transaction,” Woronka added. “However, in the near term, SIX’s stock price should effectively remain tethered to that of FUN until the merger is consummated (or unexpectedly terminated) given the fixed exchange ratio, and we don’t feel a need to effectively be “double long” the transaction, in the event that circumstances or expectations change,” the analyst noted. Six Flags stock has ticked up nearly 7% in 2024. SIX YTD mountain Six Flags ytd — Brian Evans 6:30 a.m.: Analysts expect a strong quarter from Nvidia KeyBanc analyst John Vinh doesn’t see a demand slowdown for top artificial intelligence play Nvidia ahead of quarterly results on May 22. “Despite anticipation of next-generation Blackwell GPUs in the 2H, we see limited signs of a demand pause and expect NVDA to report F1Q results and F2Q guidance meaningfully above expectations,” Vinh said. The analyst reiterated an overweight rating on the stock as well as a $1,200 per share price target, implying more than 31% upside from Tuesday’s close. UBS analyst Timothy Arcuri also expects a first-quarter beat, specifically driven by stronger-than-expected lead times preceding results. “As lead times have come in substantially, we see enough room for NVDA to post FQ1E (April) revenue potentially as high as $26B (data center ~$22-23B) and potentially guide to ~$27-28B in total revenue (data center ~$25-26B) – both good enough to keep the stock biased higher, in our view,” Arcuri said. The analyst has a buy rating on Nvidia with a $1,150 per share price target, or about 26% upside ahead. Nvidia stock has added more than 84% in 2024. — Brian Evans 5:44 a.m.: Alphabet to remain a leader among AI-driven businesses after developer conference, Goldman Sachs says Alphabet’s I/O developer event has Goldman Sachs analyst Eric Sheridan convinced that the firm will cement its position as one of the leaders in artificial intelligence-driven businesses. “We came away increasingly constructive on Alphabet’s long-term strategic positioning in a number of key end markets and continue to see the company as the leading collection of AI/machine learning-driven businesses in our coverage universe,” Sheridan wrote on Wednesday. “In our view, as the AI large language (foundational) model layer shows less incremental improvements with each iteration, we see the best-positioned companies as those that can seamlessly integrate AI features into consumer-facing and enterprise-facing products to generate wide-scale adoption,” he cautioned. Google on Tuesday unveiled updates to its Gemini AI model along with new search features, including AI Overviews, which summarize answers to search questions. Sheridan reiterated a buy rating on Alphabet stock alongside a $195 per share price target, which equates to roughly 15% upside from Tuesday’s $170.34 close. Oppenheimer analyst Jason Helfstein also said the event should “assuage fears” over the company’s AI competitive position. “Relative to OpenAI’s limited product demo the day before, we believe GOOG demonstrated its strong competitive position, driven by an essentially unlimited R & D budget, access to the largest user & data library, and 10 years of machine learning focus,” said Helfstein, who reiterated his outperform rating. Brent Thill of Jefferies also noted the company delivered “some gems” at the event. “We believe generative AI will ultimately give GOOGL an expanded role in search, as ‘Google will 1715773379 do the Googling for you.'” Alphabet stock has added 22% in 2024. — Brian Evans 5:44 a.m.: JPMorgan upgrades Nio to neutral The outlook for Nio is improving, but it’s still murky, according to JPMorgan. Analyst Nick Lai upgraded the Chinese electric vehicle maker to neutral from underweight. He also raised his price target on U.S.-listed shares to $5.40 per share from $4.80, though the new forecast calls for a 6% decline over the next year. The stock has been on a tear recently, surging 48% over the past month. However, it’s down more than 36% year to date, as the global EV market faces waning demand. NIO YTD mountain NIO YTD Lai had downgraded Nio to underweight in February due to slowing sales momentum. Now, the analysts sees two catalysts that could continue the stock’s recent surge: “1) Chinese government stimulus policy to boost auto demand including NEV which NIO should also benefit from; and 2) NIO’s latest battery as a service (BaaS) strategy by lowering buyers’ monthly rental fee (by ~25%) has not only successfully boosted store traffic and BaaS take rate … but also driven its sales momentum.” Shares popped more than 3% in the premarket following the rating change. — Fred Imbert
