Wall Street Loves Penn Entertainment, Baidu, Qualcomm Stocks Today

Just this morning, analysts at Stifel upgraded Penn Entertainment (NASDAQ: PENN) to a buy rating, with a price target of $21 a share. This follows its termination of its sports betting agreement with ESPN earlier than planned.

“When we first announced our partnership with ESPN, both sides made it clear that we expected to compete for a podium position in the space,” said Jay Snowden, CEO and President of PENN Entertainment, in a company press release.

“Although we made significant progress in improving our product offering and building a cohesive ecosystem with ESPN, we have mutually and amicably agreed to wind down our collaboration. We plan to realign our digital focus on our growing iCasino business, while continuing to capitalize on our omnichannel advantage as the nation’s leading regional retail casino operator,” he added.

Analysts at Stifel say this termination will provide a tailwind for PENN moving forward.

Other hot stocks seeing upgrades include:

Baidu (NASDAQ: BIDU): Deutsche Bank just upgraded Daidu to a buy rating with a price target of $156 from $88 a share. The firm points to AI as the company’s next key driver. They also point to AI drivers boosting Daidu, including the Baidu AI Cloud and Baidu’s growing intelligent search. Plus, its chip subsidiary is well-positioned to capture AI capex.

Qualcomm (NASDAQ: QCOM): Analysts at Bank of America just reiterated a buy rating on Qualcomm with a price target of $215. The firm believes Qualcomm is a long-term beneficiary of 3G-4G-5G smartphone, tablet, and cellular-enabled machine-to-machine adoption worldwide.

Datadog (NASDAQ: DDOG): Analysts at KeyBanc just upgraded Datadogto an overweight rating with a price target of $230 a share. As noted by Investing.com, “KeyBanc noted that Datadog’s revenue growth excluding OpenAI had accelerated, with strength appearing broad-based across the business. The firm also highlighted that OpenAI renewed and expanded its commitment to Datadog in the third quarter.”

Just the other day, Bank of America reiterated a buy rating on Datadog ahead of the company’s earnings on November 6, with a price target of $180, up from $175, due to growing confidence in the stock.