Coinbase, JNJ, PayPal, RTX, Pinterest Trending With Analysts

Analysts are intrested in these 5 stocks: ( (COIN) ), ( (JNJ) ), ( (PYPL) ), ( (RTX) ) and ( (PINS) ). Here is a breakdown of their recent ratings and the rationale behind them.

Coinbase Global is back in the spotlight as Baird analyst Robert Bamberger initiates coverage with a Neutral (Hold) rating and a $240 price target, signaling that the risk‑reward looks finely balanced after a volatile stretch for crypto markets. His report highlights Coinbase’s position as the largest US-based crypto exchange, with roughly 50% share of US spot trading and about 6% of global volume, and a business increasingly split between trading fees and steadier subscription and services revenues such as USDC interest, staking, custody, and Coinbase One. On the positive side, Bamberger sees a compelling long‑term growth story: subscription revenues have surged from about 4% of total turnover in 2020 to around 40% by Q3 2025, and the “Everything Exchange” strategy—adding derivatives, prediction markets, stock trading and more—could meaningfully expand its addressable market and diversify away from pure trading volumes. He also expects EPS to grow 20–25% annually over the next few years, supported by mid‑teens revenue growth and expanding margins as operating cost growth slows in 2026. However, near‑term headwinds temper his enthusiasm: trading volumes remain weak after the October crypto crash, Q4 transaction and stablecoin revenues are likely to disappoint, regulatory uncertainty around the Clarity Act and rewards yields could dampen USDC incentives, retail trading spreads are compressing, and lower interest rates could dent high‑margin float income. With the stock already trading near its five‑year average EV/revenue multiple despite softer volumes, Bamberger prefers to wait for a pullback before turning more bullish, framing Coinbase as a higher‑risk name where upside is real but already largely recognized by the market.

Johnson & Johnson, by contrast, is being recast as a growth story in big pharma, with Morgan Stanley’s Terence Flynn upgrading the stock to Overweight (Buy) and lifting his price target sharply to $262 from $200. Flynn argues that J&J’s strong showings in 2025—outperforming the S&P 500 and the broader pharma complex—have been backed up by a much clearer outlook for both growth and regulation following recent Biopharma MFN agreements that removed a key overhang for the sector. While he concedes that further multiple expansion may be limited with the shares now trading at about 19x and 17x his 2026 and 2027 EPS estimates, he notes that J&J still trades at roughly a 3x P/E discount to the S&P 500, even as he is roughly 20% above consensus on earnings thanks to a wave of new products. His team is particularly upbeat on Tremfya and Icotyde in immunology, Tecvayli and Carvykti in multiple myeloma, and Rybrevant in lung cancer—areas reinforced at Morgan Stanley’s recent Therapeutics Doctor Days—leading them to raise sales estimates by an additional $3–7 billion annually on top of J&J’s already massive $100 billion-plus revenue base. Flynn now projects 2026–2030 revenue and EPS CAGRs of about 5.5% and 12%, respectively, putting J&J firmly in the “higher growth” cohort among large biopharma peers even while its loss‑of‑exclusivity profile remains manageable. For investors, the message is that J&J is no longer just a defensive healthcare giant; it is a diversified innovator with enough pipeline momentum to drive EPS beats, offering growth at a discount in a sector where many names have already rerated.

PayPal Holdings finds itself on the other side of the sentiment spectrum, as Morgan Stanley’s James Faucette downgrades the payments giant to Underweight (Sell) and cuts his price target to $50, warning that the company’s core Branded Checkout franchise is losing steam just as competition intensifies. Faucette has trimmed his 2026 outlook for Branded Checkout growth from 3.9% to 3.3%, citing more cautious management commentary, slightly softer e‑commerce data into the holiday period, and evidence that PayPal continues to surrender market share to rivals as it struggles to modernize its checkout integrations. After roughly 15 months of effort, only about a quarter of merchants have moved to the new checkout experience, and just half of those are on the most highly optimized version that can deliver around a one‑percentage‑point lift in conversion—a slow pace that weighs on transaction growth and margins. He now expects transaction margin dollars to rise just 3.4% in 2026, and he is also rolling back one of his earlier pillars of support: aggressive share buybacks. Instead of assuming PayPal will return about 90% of its free cash flow via repurchases, he now models $4.5 billion in buybacks in 2026—roughly 75% of FCF—as he believes management will need to redirect more capital into improving the product, accelerating Venmo acceptance, and preparing for “agentic commerce,” where AI agents handle purchases on users’ behalf. With US non‑store retail growth decelerating, PayPal’s more vulnerable middle‑income customer base under pressure, and holiday trends pointing to possibly steeper share losses than his forecasts already assume, Faucette sees a tougher road ahead. The result is a more cautious stance: investors are being warned that PayPal may need to invest more and buy back less just to defend its position, potentially limiting upside for shareholders in the near term.

RTX Corp, the aerospace and defense heavyweight, is emerging as a favored name in the sector, with Morgan Stanley’s Kristine Liwag initiating (and effectively reinstating) RTX as her Top Pick in aerospace, assigning a Buy rating and boosting her price target to $235 from $215. Her call follows RTX’s fourth‑quarter 2025 results, which came in cleanly and were coupled with a 2026 outlook that roughly brackets consensus estimates, enough to push the stock roughly 3.7% higher against a modest gain in the broader market. Liwag’s thesis is that RTX sits at the intersection of powerful secular tailwinds: commercial aircraft production is ramping up, driving strong demand for original equipment and parts, while the commercial aftermarket—covering spares, pricing, and engine maintenance, repair, and overhaul (MRO)—looks set for durable high‑single‑digit growth as airlines keep fleets flying longer. On the defense side, she sees an increasingly attractive growth backdrop, both domestically and internationally, as geopolitical tensions and modernization initiatives support sustained spending on advanced systems where RTX has a differentiated portfolio. Crucially for valuation‑focused investors, Liwag argues that the market underappreciates this growth and margin expansion potential: on a 2027 price‑to‑free‑cash‑flow basis, RTX trades at a steep discount of roughly 21% to General Electric, despite similar or better underlying fundamentals. She expects continued productivity improvements and disciplined capital allocation—maintaining an attractive dividend while still investing to meet customer demand and fund long‑term growth—to drive a re‑rating closer to peers. For investors looking for a blend of growth, income, and potential multiple expansion, RTX is being positioned as a rare case in today’s aerospace landscape: a large‑cap name with both cyclical and structural drivers, trading at what Liwag views as a compelling valuation.

Pinterest is drawing sharply divided views from Wall Street, with Citi’s Ronald Josey reiterating a bullish stance while HSBC’s Mohammed Khallouf turns more cautious, underscoring both the opportunity and the execution risk around the company’s aggressive pivot toward AI and efficiency. Josey, who rates PINS a Buy with a $38 target and classifies it as high risk, framed the company’s newly announced 15% reduction in force—potentially affecting around 780 employees—and office space cuts as a strategic reset: a move to reorganize around AI‑driven products like Visual Search, the Shopping‑focused Assistant, and newer AI relevance models, while rebuilding its sales organization under a new chief business officer. He estimates that the restructuring, which should be completed by the third quarter of 2026 and carries a $35–45 million pre‑tax charge, could translate into $275–375 million in gross cost savings before reinvestment, boosting profitability over time. With the stock dropping about 8% to roughly $24 on the news and trading at roughly 6.5x his 2027 EV/EBITDA estimate, Josey argues the valuation looks attractive if Pinterest can reignite revenue growth—particularly in its key UCAN region—and scale newer ad tools like Pinterest+ and ROAS bidding; his 2027 numbers imply EBITDA of $1.876 billion and an enterprise value near $22 billion, or about 12x EV/EBITDA at his target price. Khallouf, however, has moved to the sidelines, downgrading Pinterest to Hold and slashing his target to $24.90 from $34.50 as he trims 2026–27 revenue forecasts by roughly 2–3%. He interprets the abrupt layoffs—coming soon after a hiring spree that added 500 employees over the first nine months of 2025 and just ahead of Q4 earnings—as a sign of softer near‑term demand and a business scrambling to catch up in the AI race. Despite years of AI investments, Pinterest’s growth is lagging peers that are seen as AI leaders: Q3 2025 revenues rose 17% year on year versus 26% at Meta and 68% at Reddit, while North American monetization gains have been modest and user engagement appears flat. Khallouf also flags new threats on the horizon, from AI‑driven “agentic commerce” that could bypass Pinterest’s discovery role, to the flood of low‑quality AI content, to Meta’s rapid integration of large language models into its ad and recommendation systems. Even so, he acknowledges that Pinterest’s shares now trade at only about 2.6x next‑twelve‑month sales, a roughly 60% discount to their five‑year average, which he sees as a valuation cushion that offsets some of the strategic concerns. For investors, the split verdict boils down to a simple question: is Pinterest a discounted turnaround AI beneficiary, as Josey suggests, or a tier‑two platform struggling to keep pace with bigger tech rivals, as Khallouf warns?