Iren Limited’s (IREN) shares fell over 3% on Thursday after Cantor Fitzgerald’s five-star analyst Brett Knoblauch slashed his price target for the AI cloud company by about 26%. However, Knoblauch kept his Overweight (Buy) rating on IREN, even as he noted that the AI infrastructure sector is “an attractive place to invest.”
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Trade AMZN with leverageWhy Cantor Fitzgerald Sees Gain for AI Infrastructure Firms
Specifically, the analyst trimmed his IREN price target from $82 to $61, suggesting more than 69% upside. In his commentary, Knoblauch noted that adoption of artificial intelligence is set to spread across almost all areas of business and the economy.
The analyst believes that this trend would prove beneficial for AI infrastructure firms, as investors have shown to attach less importance to which AI applications or models lead the proliferation in adoption. Furthermore, Knoblauch expects that demand for AI infrastructure will remain strong for at least the next five years, which should help keep prices elevated.
Cantor Fitzgerald’s heavy price target cut on IREN comes as shares in the Sydney-based company have wobbled lately due to investor concerns about massive AI capital spending by hyperscalers such as Amazon (AMZN), Alphabet (GOOGL), and Meta (META).
This worry rippled through the neocloud sector, where Iren, alongside peers such as CoreWeave (CRWV) and Nebius (NBIS), actively chases opportunities to supply the extra AI cloud computing capacity needed by these hyperscalers.
Earlier this month, equity research firm Freedom Capital called Iren a Hold, warning that its shift from cryptocurrency mining to an AI cloud infrastructure business may take longer than management has indicated.
Is IREN Stock a Strong Buy?
Across Wall Street, analysts’ consensus rating on IREN’s shares remains a Moderate Buy. This is based on eight Buys, three Holds, and one Sell rating issued over the past three months.
However, the average IREN price target of $73.30 implies an impressive 107% upside.
