Nucor: Near-Term Cyclical Weakness Creates a Buy Opportunity Ahead of 2026-Driven Recovery

In a report released yesterday, Carlos De Alba from Morgan Stanley maintained a Buy rating on Nucor, with a price target of $165.00.

Carlos De Alba has given his Buy rating due to a combination of factors that balance near‑term softness with a constructive medium‑term outlook. While the company’s fourth‑quarter 2025 earnings guidance came in significantly below both market expectations and his own forecast, he notes that Nucor has a recent record of outperforming its guidance and continues to allocate capital to share repurchases, signaling confidence in underlying fundamentals and cash generation. He also recognizes that the anticipated sequential earnings pressure is largely cyclical and concentrated in specific areas such as sheet, where lower volumes and margin compression are expected to weigh on results in the near term.
Carlos De Alba’s positive stance is underpinned by Nucor’s positioning for 2026, where the company reports substantially stronger order books than a year ago, particularly in construction‑linked markets including energy, infrastructure, data centers, and manufacturing. He expects these robust backlogs, combined with supportive U.S. industrial and infrastructure policies, to provide a favorable backdrop for earnings recovery and growth. In his view, the current guidance‑related weakness in the stock presents an opportunity to invest ahead of improving demand, better pricing dynamics, and the eventual normalization of segment profitability, justifying a Buy recommendation despite the short‑term headwinds.

According to TipRanks, De Alba is a 5-star analyst with an average return of 15.7% and a 58.58% success rate. De Alba covers the Basic Materials sector, focusing on stocks such as Alcoa, Freeport-McMoRan, and Cleveland-Cliffs.

In another report released today, Wells Fargo also maintained a Buy rating on the stock with a $176.00 price target.