Verizon making $20B fiber buy, Topgolf and Fortive splitting up: Morning Buzz

Get caught up quickly on the top news and calls moving stocks with these five Top Five lists.

1. STOCK NEWS:

• Verizon (VZ) announced a $20B deal to acquire Frontier Communications (FYBR) for $38.50 per share in cash
• Applied Digital (APLD) announced $160M in strategic financing from Nvidia (NVDA) and other investors
• Topgolf Callaway (MODG) plans to separate into two independent companies
• Fortive (FTV) also announced plans for a separation into two independent public companies
• HP Enterprise (HPE) reported what CEO Antonio Neri called “a strong third quarter” and raised its FY24 EPS view

2. WALL STREET CALLS:

• Wells Fargo upgraded Roku (ROKU) to Equal Weight on Roku Channel growth
• Craig-Hallum upped QuidelOrtho (QDEL) to Buy on untapped earnings power
• General Motors (GM) assumed at Peer Perform from Outperform at Wolfe Research
• Morgan Stanley downgraded PagBank (PAGS) and StoneCo (STNE) to Underweight as the firm anticipates a significant slowdown in payment volume growth due to the already high penetration of digital payments in Brazil
• JPMorgan upgraded XPeng (XPEV) to Overweight

3. AROUND THE WEB:

• Netflix (NFLX) is struggling to reduce its productions’ carbon footprint, Bloomberg reports
• Police are investigating five current and former AstraZeneca (AZN) employees over infringement of data privacy laws and importing an unlicensed medicine, Bloomberg says
• Stellantis (STLA) is temporarily pausing production of the Jeep Wranglers and Grand Cherokee vehicles amid dealer gripes over high vehicle inventories, WSJ reports
• Boeing’s (BA) Starliner spacecraft is set to begin its return to Earth on Friday evening, NY Times says
• Fuzzy Panda Research issued a cautious report on Napco Security (NSSC)

4. MOVERS:

• Sotera Health (SHC) gains after announcing a 25M share offering
• Tesla (TSLA) increases after announcing it will launch its Full Self Driving driver assistance product in Europe and China early next year
• ChargePoint (CHPT) falls after reporting Q2 results and announcing plans to reorganize
• AST SpaceMobile (ASTS) lower after filing for an automatic mixed securities shelf
• Credo Technology (CRDO) declines in New York after reporting Q1 results and providing guidance for Q2

5. EARNINGS/GUIDANCE:

• JetBlue (JBLU) raised its Q3 guidance
• C3.ai (AI) reported Q1 results, with CEO Thomas Siebel commenting, “We had a solid start to the fiscal year”
• Couchbase (BASE) reported Q2 results and provided guidance for Q3 and FY25
• Verint (VRNT) announced Q2 results and backed its guidance for FY25
• Nio (NIO) reported Q2 results and provided guidance for Q3

INDEXES:

Near midday, the Dow was down 388.21, or 0.95%, to 40,586.76, the Nasdaq was down 40.10, or 0.23%, to 17,044.20, and the S&P 500 was down 36.57, or 0.66%, to 5,483.50.