Author: Vitaliy Dadalyan

Last Minute Thought: Buy or Sell IBM Before Earnings?

Over the last few years – and certainly since the March crash - tech stocks have been on a tear. However, veteran tech giant IBM (IBM) has found it difficult to keep up, and has lagged behind the whole market. Yet, with F2Q earnings due today after market close, could sentiment be changing?With the Street calling for a year-over-year drop of 35% to revenue of $17.7 billion and EPS to decline by 8% to $2.07, Merrill Lynch analyst Wamsi Mohan argues the low expectations could provide IBM with a minor victory when it releases its quarterly statement this evening.Mohan said, “We expect IBM to report a small beat relative to a very depressed consensus in the wake of COVID-19. Consensus is modeling a flat q/q trend vs normally up mid-single digits. However, while near term trends will be scrutinized, we think the more important catalyst will be an update from CEO Arvind...

AstraZeneca Vaccine Data Appear Less Competitive, Analysts Say

(Bloomberg) -- AstraZeneca Plc fell from a record high in New York trading after data for the company’s Covid-19 vaccine candidate, though promising, fueled concerns about whether it can match competitors.Bernstein analysts led by Ronny Gal said the vaccine, developed in partnership with the University of Oxford, showed early positive data, but the benefits didn’t appear to match the bar set by programs from Pfizer Inc. and BioNtech SE, as well as Moderna Inc.“In the competitive context they fail to impress,” Gal wrote.Exacerbating concerns, the Lancet medical journal publication came just an hour after Pfizer and BioNtech had announced early positive data from their Covid-19 vaccine trial in Germany, which builds upon promising results from their program earlier this month.U.S. listed shares of AstraZeneca fell as much as 5.7% -- the biggest intraday decline since March -- bringing the stock’s year-to-date gain to 19%. Moderna, which is among biotech’s hottest stocks,...

Tesla share rally propels some early fan investors to riches

Convinced of Tesla Inc's imminent meteoric rise, Orestis Palampougioukis, a Netherlands-based software developer, took out a 43,000 euro ($49,000) loan in early October to invest it all in the electric carmaker, which at the time was trading at around $230 a share. Since then, Palampougioukis' bet has paid off as Tesla's share price has increased more than six-fold, trading around $1,500 on Monday and surpassing every rival to become the world's highest-valued automaker. "To me it didn't feel like a bet because I studied what Tesla does very closely and it's simply inevitable that it would dominate," Palampougioukis said, adding that he plans to own the shares for decades....