These reports, excerpted and edited by Barron's, were issued recently by investment and research firms. The reports are a sampling of analysts' thinking; they should not be considered the views or recommendations of Barron's. Some of the reports' issuers have provided, or hope to provide, investment-banking or other services to the companies being analyzed.

Amazon.com -- AMZN-Nasdaq Buy -- $224.94 on Jan. 21 by BofA Securities Amazon.com outperformed the Nasdaq Composite and e-commerce sector in 2024 (44% versus 25% for Nasdaq), aided by multiple expansion with forward-year price/sales growing to 3.1 times (vs. 2.3 times at start of 2024).

While Amazon Web Services growth and retail-margin expectations have increased, we think artificial-intelligence-driven cloud growth remains a top sector opportunity, while retail margin expansion can continue to drive outsize profit growth versus peers. Amazon is also relatively well positioned for impact of U.S. dollar appreciation, which aids cloud margins.

Key positives for 2025 include: 1) strong AI-demand cycle for AWS drives upside; 2) further retail margin efficiencies drive outsize profit growth; 3) a robotics play, which should drive a multiyear productivity cycle and reduce labor dependence; 4) ramp in Prime Video ad dollars; 5) further head-count cost savings from midlevel manager cuts; and 6) online retail normalization, as data points suggest a meet/beat fourth-quarter/holiday season. Price objective: $255.

Nvidia -- NVDA-Nasdaq Buy -- $137.71 on Jan. 17 by UBS Nvidia has essentially tread water since last earnings, in part due to supply-chain noise and concerns around the ramp of Blackwell server racks. We remain confident that Nvidia will deliver strong fiscal-fourth-quarter (January) results and fiscal-first-quarter (April) guidance, and that investor concerns around a near-term "air pocket" are overblown....Net, our estimates are largely unchanged and our price target remains $185.

Carnival -- CCL-NYSE Outperform -- $25.60 on Jan. 22 by Mizuho The most incremental aspect of the story today in our view is Carnival's increasing leverage to private destinations. Celebration Key [a new private beach development in the Bahamas] opens in July 2025, and will represent 4% to 5% capacity in 2025, and 14% to 15% in 2026, with a path materially higher in the future. Said differently, we believe that about two million people will visit Celebration Key in 2025, with Carnival pointing to an ability to bring future capacity closer to seven million-plus over time.

For context, Royal Caribbean's CocoCay is 3.5 million. The second pier timeline has been pulled forward, which theoretically allows Carnival to meet the current land capacity of 13,000 to 14,000 per day, or four million to five million guests (prior to any further expansion, which it sounds like is already being contemplated). Price target: $32.

Seagate Technology Holdings -- STX-Nasdaq Overweight -- $97.67 on Jan. 17 by Morgan Stanley Seagate Technology Holdings shares have underperformed the S&P 500 index by 18 points and our information-technology hardware coverage by 14 points since fiscal first-quarter earnings in October 2024, primarily due to cycle-related concerns, which has been exacerbated by a supply issue disclosed in an early-December 2024 8-K.

However, our recent industry checks give us greater confidence that: 1) even after six quarters of quarter-over-quarter capacity growth, hard disk drive, or HDD, nearline storage demand remains robust, cloud service provider HDD inventory remains in-check, and HDD pricing continues to grow Q/Q; and 2) the supply issue negatively impacting March-quarter results should be transitory.

At the same time, our updated heat-assisted magnetic recording, or HAMR, volume and margin analysis points to consensus gross margins estimates that remain too conservative in the near to medium term....With short interest close to a 12-month high and low expectations heading into calendar first-half 2025, we are taking the contrarian view and elevating Seagate to our Top Pick. Price target: $129.

Netflix -- NFLX-Nasdaq Buy -- $869.69 on Jan. 21 by Seaport Research Partners Increasing our Netflix price target to $1,025 on the much-better-than-expected net adds of 18.9 million-plus members, the flow-through to a higher 2025 revenue guide, and the increased 2025 estimated operating income margin guide to 29% from 28%. Netflix continues to prove that it is the best house on the streaming block, and is priced accordingly at 32.4 times estimated 2025 enterprise value/operating income before depreciation and amortization.

Affirm Holdings -- AFRM-Nasdaq Neutral -- $57.99 on Jan. 21 by Susquehanna Financial Group Consistent with the investment thesis we laid out during our initiation, we believe that buy now, pay later, or BNPL, is growing in usage similar to the early days of debit. If this is the case, the future looks bright with a long journey ahead.

However, we have valuation parameters that we adhere to and honor, and the shares have reached our price target. At the same time, data on U.S. online spending during the holiday season suggest that BNPL share of spending didn't increase much year over year, which may imply that Affirm gross merchandise volume could come in below consensus.

While we remain confident in Affirm's long-term ability to gain share from debit and credit fueled by its expansion offline and internationally, we are trimming estimates modestly and moving to Neutral while maintaining our $57 price target.

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January 24, 2025 18:54 ET (23:54 GMT)

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