Barclays upgraded Rocket Companies ( RKT ) and First American Financial ( FAF ) on an expected increase in mortgage volumes. "Despite a 40 bps increase in the 30Y FRM to 6.38% since the trough in February, the mortgage rate is only 23 bps higher than at the start of the year and lower than the average (6.58%) for all of FY25," said analyst Terry Ma. "As a result, we still expect overall mortgage v...
Barclays upgraded Rocket Companies ( RKT ) and First American Financial ( FAF ) on an expected increase in mortgage volumes. "Despite a 40 bps increase in the 30Y FRM to 6.38% since the trough in February, the mortgage rate is only 23 bps higher than at the start of the year and lower than the average (6.58%) for all of FY25," said analyst Terry Ma. "As a result, we still expect overall mortgage volumes to increase ~8.9% y/y vs. FY25," added Ma. "Of note, our base case is for the Iran conflict to deescalate over the coming weeks. For 1Q, based on channel checks, mortgage volumes were likely robust during the first two months but softened in March, while prepayments were likely elevated through the quarter," said the research note. RKT and FAF were raised to Overweight from Equal Weight. "Post COOP merger, RKT has a more balanced business mix (including ~$5B of servicing revenues) that should help the company generate more stable operating results through the interest rate cycle. We think the recent sell-off underappreciates this point," said the research note. "Similar to RKT, we view the valuation for FAF as overly discounted," said Ma. More on Rocket Companies, First American Financial Rocket Companies: Rich Valuation Multiples Despite Compass Deal Opportunity Rocket Companies: A 30% Firesale Is A Buying Opportunity, Low Mortgage Rates First American Financial: Lower Rates Are A Benefit Most oversold financial stocks above $10B on Wall Street amid Middle East disruptions Rocket Cos., UWM Holdings slide after Better partners with OpenAI on mortgage decision app
jetcityimage With the recent oil shock shifting the economic landscape and pressuring an already stretched lower- and middle-income consumer, Carvana ( CVNA ) faces a more challenged outlook than it did heading into 2026, leading BofA Securities’ Michael McGovern to downgrade the stock to Neutral from Buy to reflect a more balanced risk/reward. “We think the company is positioned for high levels o...
jetcityimage With the recent oil shock shifting the economic landscape and pressuring an already stretched lower- and middle-income consumer, Carvana ( CVNA ) faces a more challenged outlook than it did heading into 2026, leading BofA Securities’ Michael McGovern to downgrade the stock to Neutral from Buy to reflect a more balanced risk/reward. “We think the company is positioned for high levels of sustained growth long term but think the medium term could see some level of increasing industry competition, with consumer demand resilient but [gross profit per unit] seeing some headwinds,” McGovern writes in his note. Among those headwinds are the increase in 2-year yields, which could compress excess spreads as management aims to compete on financing rates; higher gas prices, which will continue to pressure discretionary spending, especially for younger car buyers; and competitive pressures that could fuel a price war within the car-buying space. Finally, tax refund season has been less of an “accelerant” on a year-over-year basis, as BofA data shows that post-refund debt payments have risen across income cohorts, suggesting households may be prioritizing debt repayment over new purchases. “We are downgrading Carvana to Neutral from Buy as we think the broader industry setup looks incrementally less favorable, particularly following the recent oil shock and other industry headwinds,” McGovern writes in his research note to clients. While the majority of Wall Street analysts remain bullish on Carvana ( CVNA ), Seeking Alpha authors as well as Seeking Alpha's Quant rating view the stock as a Hold with a Quant score of 2.91 out of 5. Carvana ( CVNA ) reports first-quarter results after the close on April 29, with expectations for the company to have earned an adjusted profit of $1.53 per share on $6.03B in sales, an increase of 1.3% and 42% from the same quarter last year, respectively. More on Carvana Carvana's Mounting Headwinds Warrant Caution - Maintain Hold Carvana...
Nerdy ( NRDY ) said on Monday that Atul Bagga had been appointed CFO, effective April 6, 2026, succeeding Jason Pello, who stepped down on April 3, 2026. Bagga joins from JLL ( JLL ), where he had served as CFO of JLL Technologies and head of global FP&A since 2021, and previously held senior finance roles at Amazon Web Services, including finance director for AWS Compute Services. The company for...
Nerdy ( NRDY ) said on Monday that Atul Bagga had been appointed CFO, effective April 6, 2026, succeeding Jason Pello, who stepped down on April 3, 2026. Bagga joins from JLL ( JLL ), where he had served as CFO of JLL Technologies and head of global FP&A since 2021, and previously held senior finance roles at Amazon Web Services, including finance director for AWS Compute Services. The company forecasts 2026 revenue of $180M to $190M vs. a consensus of $182.98M and expects non-GAAP adjusted EBITDA to be approximately breakeven. This implies margin improvement of over 1,000 basis points from 2025. It expects to end 2026 with $40M to $45M in cash, including $20M from a new term loan, and sufficient liquidity to fund growth Shares +2.18%. More on Nerdy Nerdy Inc. (NRDY) Q4 2025 Earnings Call Transcript Nerdy receives notice from NYSE Nerdy targets $180M–$190M 2026 revenue with AI-native platform and breakeven EBITDA through cost discipline Seeking Alpha’s Quant Rating on Nerdy Historical earnings data for Nerdy
wildpixel/iStock via Getty Images Celestica stock ( CLS ) surprised me recently. I thought it will break down further. Yet, that didn't quite pan out. There was a little scare, but the buyers held the line stoutly. I guess you probably guessed why. In mid-March, we found out that AMD has inked a partnership with Celestica “to bring the new Helios rack-scale AI platform to market." If you looked at...
wildpixel/iStock via Getty Images Celestica stock ( CLS ) surprised me recently. I thought it will break down further. Yet, that didn't quite pan out. There was a little scare, but the buyers held the line stoutly. I guess you probably guessed why. In mid-March, we found out that AMD has inked a partnership with Celestica “to bring the new Helios rack-scale AI platform to market." If you looked at the print, it really helped to fend off further selling. After all, the long consolidation from late 2025 has also caused some consternation as the stock dropped into a bear market. AMD has been busy making deals lately. Under CEO Lisa Su's leadership, it is showing ambitions to take on Nvidia ( NVDA ). Easier said than done, I know. so AMD needs more friends, don't you think? And thus, the CLS deal comes in handy. And that also offers Celestica more opportunities to grow into the expanded CapEx outlook for this year. Also, I think things are going to become even more exciting, with AI agents proliferating. I admit that I kept a cautious rating on CLS in my last write-up. I didn't think that the AI buildout momentum could be maintained. And, Celestica doesn't quite have the strongest margins in the tech sector, right? However, the AMD announcement has kind of shifted the narrative for me. It shows that Celestica has more opportunities beyond the primary Broadcom partnership than I thought. And it's not as if Broadcom is going into a decline. And then, if we bring in the potential explosion of AI agents from this year as Anthropic's ( ANTHRO ) Claude Code has shown us so far, it's hard to argue against CLS bulls, I think. More compute, not less, right? These compute hungry and always on AI agents will gobble up the capacity constrained setup. For CLS, networking growth is going to be the next lever that will shoot through the roof. In other words, a much fretted about slowdown may not yet show itself yet. Maybe next time, but not yet. Not now, at least. And we already know ...
Key Events This Week: CPI, PCE, Durable, FOMC Minutes And More In addition to Iran war developments, this week’s economic calendar will focus on the inflation side of the Fed’s dual mandate following a solid March employment report. The key data releases this week are the February durable goods report on Tuesday, the February PCE report on Thursday, and the March CPI report on Friday. Fed Vice Cha...
Key Events This Week: CPI, PCE, Durable, FOMC Minutes And More In addition to Iran war developments, this week’s economic calendar will focus on the inflation side of the Fed’s dual mandate following a solid March employment report. The key data releases this week are the February durable goods report on Tuesday, the February PCE report on Thursday, and the March CPI report on Friday. Fed Vice Chair Philip Jefferson will deliver a speech on the economic outlook on Tuesday. The minutes to the FOMC’s March meeting will be released on Wednesday. Briefly recapping the latest employment data, both headline (+178k vs. -133k) and private (+186 vs. -129k) payrolls far exceeded consensus expectations. To be sure, the rebound from strike- and weather-related weakness in February payrolls was somewhat less impressive due to the downtick in average hourly earnings (+0.2% vs. +0.4%) and hours worked (34.2hrs vs. 34.3hrs). The same can be said of the surprise decline in the unemployment rate (4.26% vs. 4.44%), which was largely a function of a 332k decline in unemployment, as well as a 64k drop in employment lowering the labor force participation rate by a tenth to 61.9%. Indeed, some of the strength in the March payroll gains likely came at the expense of April given the early Easter Holiday date (April 5). Averaging through the Q1 employment reports, headline (68k) and private (79k) payroll gains are tracking up from their six-month averages of +15k and 52k, respectively. In addition, the Q1 unemployment rate averaged 4.34%, a slight improvement from the six-month average of 4.395%. In addition, Q1 ADP private employment gains averaged 46k – in line with their six-month average of 45k. Lastly, jobless claims have been stable with initial claims, on average, down 3.8% from Q1 2025 and continuing claims down 0.9%. In short, the picture that Fed officials should be getting of the labor market – at least prior to the latest geopolitical developments – is one of stability, albeit at...
US congressman decried bets on when two crew members on the F-15 jet shot down by Iranian forces would be rescued After strong criticism from a federal lawmaker, the online betting platform Polymarket stopped accepting wagers on when US warplane crew members who were shot down in Iran might be rescued. It promised to investigate how the market materialized. The criticism came from Seth Moulton, a ...
US congressman decried bets on when two crew members on the F-15 jet shot down by Iranian forces would be rescued After strong criticism from a federal lawmaker, the online betting platform Polymarket stopped accepting wagers on when US warplane crew members who were shot down in Iran might be rescued. It promised to investigate how the market materialized. The criticism came from Seth Moulton, a Massachusetts Democratic representative who earned two bronze star medals serving with the United States marine corps in Iraq from 2003 to 2008 and published an X post describing Polymarket’s acceptance of bets on the downed pilots’ fate as “DISGUSTING”. Continue reading...
The S&P Global Canada Services PMI Business Activity Index in March was at 47.2, an increase from 46.5 in February, but still shows a decline in activity, especially in business services and transport & storage. Kagenmi The seasonally adjusted S&P Global Canada Composite PMI Output Index recorded 47.6 in March, a modest improvement on February’s 47.1. "Nonetheless, the present business environment...
The S&P Global Canada Services PMI Business Activity Index in March was at 47.2, an increase from 46.5 in February, but still shows a decline in activity, especially in business services and transport & storage. Kagenmi The seasonally adjusted S&P Global Canada Composite PMI Output Index recorded 47.6 in March, a modest improvement on February’s 47.1. "Nonetheless, the present business environment is clearly challenging, with firms reporting a steep increase in their operating expenses over the month, driven mainly by increased fuel and transportation costs. However, given subdued market demand, firms’ own pricing power remains restricted leading to only partial pass through of higher costs to clients and therefore a squeeze in margins. Understandably therefore service providers took the option to save on expenses wherever possible, with any leavers generally not replaced leading to another net fall in employment over the month," said Paul Smith, Economics Director at S&P Global MarketIntelligence. More on Canada FLCA: Warrants Broader Interest, But Wait For A Pullback Canada’s February trade deficit rises as imports outpace exports Canada's manufacturing sector stagnates in March Seeking Alpha’s Quant Rating on Franklin FTSE Canada ETF Dividend scorecard for Franklin FTSE Canada ETF
American artist Jeff Koons, known for his paintings, sculptures and installations, like Balloon Dog, Puppy and Play-Doh, sits down with David Rubenstein to talk about his work and where he finds inspiration, often drawing from popular culture and everyday objects. He also explains why he believes art should be "accessible." In this week's episode of "The David Rubenstein Show: Peer to Peer Convers...
American artist Jeff Koons, known for his paintings, sculptures and installations, like Balloon Dog, Puppy and Play-Doh, sits down with David Rubenstein to talk about his work and where he finds inspiration, often drawing from popular culture and everyday objects. He also explains why he believes art should be "accessible." In this week's episode of "The David Rubenstein Show: Peer to Peer Conversations," Koons reflects on his early days working at the MoMA membership desk and later as a commodities broker on Wall Street. He says his primary ambition was to "participate" in the dialogue of the art world and be part of a community. This interview was recorded February 2 in New York. (Source: Bloomberg)
wildpixel/iStock via Getty Images The market had very high expectations heading into President Trump's April 1 speech, as noted by the (brief) relief rally this past week. A rally that, by the way, I was extremely skeptical about joining, as the pessimistic tone of my two earlier notes this week probably made clear: " Too Early To Call The Bottom" " The Market Can Still Climb This Wall Of Worry - ...
wildpixel/iStock via Getty Images The market had very high expectations heading into President Trump's April 1 speech, as noted by the (brief) relief rally this past week. A rally that, by the way, I was extremely skeptical about joining, as the pessimistic tone of my two earlier notes this week probably made clear: " Too Early To Call The Bottom" " The Market Can Still Climb This Wall Of Worry - But Not Yet." Some of the readers familiar with my notes tend to see me as a permabull, mostly because of how many strong buys I had on the S&P 500 ( SP500 ) while the music was playing in the second half of last year. Seeking Alpha Well, it turns out that I'm not. In fact, as I said back in January, I aggressively moved to cash after I noticed early signs of a market correction. Of course, I didn't predict the Iran conflict, but I had a high conviction that the investors would go in risk-off mode on any negative headlines. Well, it turned out that the Hormuz blockade was a good reason to lock in profits. That said, I am not a doomer, either. I strongly believe the markets will retest new highs in the second half of the year, as long-term inflation expectations remain well anchored despite the oil shock. Don't take the latter statement from me. Take it from Powell during his speech at Harvard University this week: Inflation expectations do appear to be well anchored beyond the short term. That's why my rating is still a hold and not a sell, as the downside risk is limited in my view. Based on astrology, I mean, technical analysis, the SPY is likely to find support in the 610-620 range. At that level, I may begin deploying cash (aggressively, likely using leverage in the form of LEAPS options). Guidance Terminal Until then, I am more than happy to play chicken with the relief rally. In other words, I'm trying to time the bottom of the selloff, which is a big risk that readers with longer timeframes should consider. This piece covers the new developments after Trump's speech...
(RTTNews) - Nuvini Group Limited (NVNI), an operator of B2B software companies, Monday announced that it has agreed to acquire a 51 percent controlling interest in Target, the American subsidiary of Beyondsoft Corporation, a Chinese IT consulting and technology services firm, for
(RTTNews) - Nuvini Group Limited (NVNI), an operator of B2B software companies, Monday announced that it has agreed to acquire a 51 percent controlling interest in Target, the American subsidiary of Beyondsoft Corporation, a Chinese IT consulting and technology services firm, for