The S&P 500 (SP500) closed in the green on Friday, after investors during the week saw earnings report from Nvidia and consumer giants including Walmart and Target.
For the week, Nasdaq (COMP:IND) and Dow (DJI) fell 2.7% AND 1.8%, respectively.
Wall Street had a slew of upgrades and downgrades from analysts. Here are some of the major calls for the week:
Dell, Hewlett Packard downgraded on surging memory prices
Dell Technologies (DELL) received a double downgrade to Underweight from Overweight from Morgan Stanley, with the brokerage reducing its price target to $110 from $144.
The brokerage acted on other original equipment manufacturers and original design manufacturers due to the surging prices of NAND and dynamic random access memory. It downgraded Hewlett Packard (HPQ) to Underweight from Equal-weight, and its PT reduced to $24 from $26, while Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE) was downgraded to Equal-weight from Overweight with its PT lowered to $25 from $28.
“We believe DELL and HPQ are ‘most-vulnerable’ amongst the US OEMs given higher DRAM exposure, more cautious recent channel checks, and lower operating margins vs. peers, while PSTG and AAPL are ‘most insulated’ amongst the group given differentiated business models and/or more software mix,” Woodring said. “We’d highlight AAPL is our only OW-rated OEM in US Technology Hardware.”
Yum! Brands upgraded following the Pizza Hut strategic review development
TD Cowen upgraded Yum! Brands (YUM) to Buy from Hold, with analyst Andrew Charles expecting the likely sale of Pizza Hut to amplify Yum! Brands growth profile.
Yum! Brands launched a formal strategic review of the Pizza Hut chain last week.
“Our above-consensus Taco Bell same-store sales is the key driver for our above consensus EPS estimates. We view the $3M AUV target as achievable given a well-balanced playbook that includes marketing, menu/beverage innovation, differentiated value & digital strength that is resonating with consumers amid a challenging industry backdrop,” updated Charles.
Looking ahead, TD Cowen sees a favorable risk-reward profile on YUM and assigned a base case PT of $173.
Medtronic upgraded after guidance raise
Goldman Sachs has upgraded Medtronic (MDT) to Neutral from Sell after the MedTech giant increased its full-year outlook for earnings and organic revenue growth.
Analyst David Roman argued that the company’s accelerated growth in R&D and SG&A expenses, which he described as the most notable components in the release, will position Medtronic to record a more sustainable performance.
“With two consecutive quarters of increasing levels of reinvestment, we think Medtronic could be entering a period of higher top-line growth performance,” Roman wrote, adding that “we now see clear evidence of the company’s strategy translating into execution.”
Palo Alto downgraded on valuation
Palo Alto Networks (PANW) was downgraded to Reduce from Hold by HSBC due in part to its valuation.
Despite Palo Alto surpassing estimates in its first quarter fiscal 2026 financial results and increasing its full-year guidance, HSBC deemed the results as “sufficient” and “not transformational.”
HSBC retained its $157 target price on the stock.
Sony gets bullish rating from Nomura
Nomura upgraded Sony (SONY) to Buy from Neutral, saying that it sees improved growth prospects for the company’s entertainment unit while continuing to expect consistently strong profits at its game & network services and music segments.
“The company has been working to expand subscription streaming businesses for some time, and we raise our rating to Buy because we think profit growth prospects have improved as these efforts start to bear fruit,” Nomura said.
The brokerage expects profit contributions to be driven by, among other things, PlayStation Plus subscriber growth, faster growth in music streaming, and improvements in the product mix for image sensors.
Oppenheimer downgraded T-Mobile US (TMUS) to Perform from Outperform. The research firm thinks T-Mobile will have a difficult time beating subscriber and FCF estimates after a decade of outsized share gains and margin expansion and believes overall industry subscriber growth is set to slow and will intensify competition.
Meanwhile, Oppenheimer started coverage on IBM (IBM) with an Outperform rating and $360 price target, a new Wall Street high.
Morgan Stanley cut the price target on HP (HPQ) to $21 from $24, ahead of the upcoming earnings of enterprise hardware original equipment manufacturers.
Daiwa upgraded XPeng (XPEV) to Buy from Hold, with analyst Kelvin Lau pointing to the company’s improving gross margin and competitiveness in the areas of robotaxis and humanoid robots. The brokerage assigned a price target of $29 to the stock.