🌞 Midday Trade: Uncle Sam's Helping Hand for Solar

First Solar has had quite the run, and analysts foresee more growth ahead.

Pencils down, it’s time for lunch. Here’s what you missed this morning:

  • 🟥 | Market Snapshot: All three major indexes fell slightly as investors interpret the latest readings on the jobs market, which show US job openings in April fell to the lowest level in more than three years.

  • 💾 | In focus: Elon Musk just made an interesting pivot… Emails circulating inside Nvidia show that Musk ordered the chipmaker to prioritize processor shipments to X and xAI over Tesla. This will delay Tesla’s order of $500 million worth of processors by months.

  • 💥 | Noteworthy: The ominous “Hindenburg Omen” was triggered last week, which is a technical analysis pattern based on breadth metrics and the percentage of stocks hitting 52-week highs and lows. The Hindenburg Omen hasn’t always been correct, but it successfully predicted the 19887 market crash and the 2008 financial crisis.

  • 🌞 | The Midday Trade: Uncle Sam's Helping Hand for Solar. Scroll down for more.

Plus, yesterday we asked: Do you think greater than or less than 190k jobs were added in May? Scroll down for the results and another survey about Spotify.

TOGETHER WITH BETTERMENT

Put your money to work in a high-yield cash account with up to $2M in FDIC† insurance through program banks.

Get started today, with as little as $10.

STREET STATS

MORNING MOVERS

GOOG: Shares of Alphabet slipped after Google announced it will cut at least 100 jobs from several teams within its fast-growing cloud unit (CNBC)

GME: GameStop’s stock fell as some investors believe the latest spike in the meme-stock rally may already be grinding to a halt (Barron’s)

BBWI: Bath & Body Works reported an earnings beat, but its stock still fell as it projected second-quarter EPS below analyst expectations (Barron’s)

AX: Axos Financial’s stock dropped after Hindenburg Research announced a short position on the stock, citing issues with its real estate loans (Bloomberg)

GTLB: Software company Gitlab saw shares fall despite beating earnings estimates as its AI features have yet to substantively benefit revenue (Barron’s)

TOP CALLS

GitLab: RBC Capital Maintains Outperform on GitLab, Lowers Price Target to $65 (Trade It)

Coveo Solutions: BMO Capital Maintains Outperform on Coveo Solutions, Lowers Price Target to C$10.5 (Trade It)

Viking Therapeutics: HC Wainwright & Co. Reiterates Buy on Viking Therapeutics, Maintains $90 Price Target (Trade It)

Guardant Health: Canaccord Genuity Maintains Buy on Guardant Health, Raises Price Target to $38 (Trade It)

Regeneron Pharmaceuticals: RBC Capital Maintains Outperform on Regeneron Pharmaceuticals, Raises Price Target to $1200 (Trade It)

SentinelOne: Canaccord Genuity Upgrades SentinelOne to Buy, Lowers Price Target to $23 (Trade It)

THE MIDDAY TRADE

Soaring Higher

First Solar (FSLR), a stock we covered back in April, is up over 58% YTD. Over the past two months, it has outperformed both the Invesco Solar ETF (ISUN) and the S&P 500. 

However, analysts think it still has plenty of room to grow thanks to tariffs and data center demand. Goldman Sachs (GS) believes those two factors could result in higher selling prices and expansion.

Tailwinds

First Solar’s foreign competition, mainly China, is being hampered by tariffs. For instance, the Biden administration announced in May that the US is increasing tariffs on imported Chinese solar modules to 50%. Goldman thinks this could help FSLR raise prices and make cheap imports become increasingly scarce. 

At the same time, the demand for electricity is growing thanks to data centers and AI. According to the bank, demand from these consumers could more than double by the end of the decade. 

Amazon (AMZN) recently unveiled plans to invest $11 billion in data centers, and Microsoft (MSFT) signed an agreement last month to receive 10.5 gigawatts of renewable energy capacity between 2026 and 2030.

In a Position to Succeed

First Solar is not specifically named in either of those deals, but Goldman is confident that it will benefit from the overall trend of increasing renewable energy demand from tech companies. 

The company has not released any plans to adjust its manufacturing capacity to meet demand, but its recent earnings call suggested that it is considering doing just that. The bank is projecting its EPS could jump 20% by 2027 if it adds a new plant. 

Goldman Sachs (GS) recently raised its price target to $302, an upside of just over 11% from Friday’s close.

TOGETHER WITH BETTERMENT

Put your money to work in a high-yield cash account with up to $2M in FDIC† insurance through program banks.

Get started today, with as little as $10.

SURVEY THE STREET

Spotify’s stock gained 5.6% yesterday after the company announced a new round of price hikes for its US subscription plans as part of a profitability push.

However, this latest price hike could endanger the streaming giant’s goal of increasing premium subscribers from 239 million in Q1 of 2024 to 245 million in Q2 of 2024.

Will Spotify Report More or Less than 245 Million Subscribers this Quarter?

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Plus, yesterday’s Poll + Results: Do you think greater than or less than 190k jobs were added in May?

  • 🟨🟨🟨⬜️⬜️⬜️ 💪 Greater than 190,000

  • 🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩 🥶 Less than 190,000

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