The futures traded lower Wednesday, after a wild day on Wall Street in which both the Dow Jones industrials and the S&P 500 once again hit intraday all-time highs, while the Nasdaq was sold off to the tune of almost 1.3%, and the S&P 500 ultimately closed down. One story attributed to The Wall Street Journal noted that the Federal Reserve may start trimming its balance sheet sooner than expected. That means ratcheting up the tapering of quantitative easing faster. The Treasury bond market responded to the news with yields across the curve rising as sellers came in a big way. The five-year Treasury note closed at the highest yield since February of 2020.
With much of the Federal Reserve’s forward-looking initiatives now baked in, including the rate lift-off and faster quantitative easing tapering in 2022, Wall Street is continuing to focus on the big increases in energy and food costs and other spiraling inflation issues. While top strategists and economists are divided on when the current inflation increase will ease, the ongoing supply chain concerns and stagflation worries remain front and center.
24/7 Wall St. reviews dozens of analyst research reports each day of the week with a goal of finding fresh ideas for investors and traders alike. Some of these daily analyst calls cover stocks to buy. Other calls cover stocks to sell or avoid. Remember that no single analyst call should ever be used as a basis to buy or sell a stock. Consensus analyst target data is from Refinitiv.
These are the top analyst upgrades, downgrades and initiations seen on Wednesday, January 5, 2022.
Air Products and Chemicals Inc. (NYSE: APD): Vertical Research raised the stock to Buy from Hold and has a $335 price target. The consensus target is $325.64. The closing trade Tuesday came in at $299.42.
Applied Materials Inc. (NASDAQ: AMAT): Jefferies resumed coverage of the semiconductor capital equipment leader with a Buy rating and $197 price target. The consensus target is $168.18. The stock closed Tuesday at $158.36.
Ball Corp. (NYSE: BLL): Citigroup cut the shares from Buy to Neutral with a $105 price target. The consensus target is $101.88. The stock closed Tuesday at $90.01, which was down close to 4% for the day.
Chevron Corp. (NYSE: CVX): Wells Fargo raised the mega-cap integrated energy heavyweight to Outperform from Market Perform. Over the past 52 weeks, the stock has traded between $84.57 and $121.98, and it has a $129.55 consensus target price. The final trade on Tuesday was reported at $121.43.
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