According to the Zhītōng Cáijīng APP, the performance of the S&P 500 index has been slightly lower than the historical high closing point of 5,433.74 points set on Thursday last week. Nevertheless, so far this year, the index has achieved nearly 14% increase, providing solid support for investors' positive sentiment. In terms of product structure, the operating income of products worth 10-30 billion yuan are respectively 401/1288/60 million yuan.
From a technical perspective of the market, Ali Walde, Oppenheimer's technical analysis chief, takes a bullish view on the blue chips and is confident about the market. He expects the market to reach new highs, and believes that even in the worst case, a selective investment strategy is appropriate. Walde particularly emphasizes the core position of large-cap growth stocks, believing that even though the bull market may be based on catching up in backward areas, market leaders, namely large-cap and growth stocks, still provide more attractive risk-return balances.
Some of Oppenheimer's top analysts follow this thinking, encouraging investors to pay attention to two specific large-cap stocks. Using the TipRanks database analysis, we can further understand Wall Street's views on these choices.
Uber Technologies (UBER.US)
As a leading company in the ride-hailing industry, Uber's innovative business model has completely changed the market's view of taxi services. From the initial ride-hailing service, to delivery, freight, business ride plans, and the meal delivery service provided by Uber Eats, Uber continues to expand its business scope. As of the end of the first quarter of 2024, Uber's services have covered more than 10,000 cities in 70 countries around the world, with 149 million monthly active platform customers and 7.1 million monthly active drivers and couriers, providing 28 million trips per day.
It is reported that Uber's performance report for the first quarter of this year showed a significant growth momentum. The company's revenue soared to $10.1 billion, a 15% year-on-year increase, which is $40 million higher than the market's expectations. In terms of travel services, Uber also performed strongly, with a year-on-year increase of 21% in travel frequency and a 20% growth in total booking volume, reaching $37.76 billion. Although this achievement is slightly lower than the market's generally expected $37.97 billion, Uber's overall performance is still impressive, reflecting its strong business growth and market leadership position.
Although Uber's stock price has risen by 61% in the past year, its growth momentum has slowed down. However, Oppenheimer's analyst Jason Helfstein believes that this is a good opportunity for investors to buy. This five-star analyst expressed his firm confidence in Uber's stock in his report: "We believe that Uber's stock has the greatest upward potential among large Internet companies, primarily due to the continuous growth of its core customer base—affluent consumers—and their strong demand for travel and service consumption. In addition, the pullback in stock price from the high point provides us with a very attractive buying opportunity. The current valuation is more reasonable than analysts expected a day earlier, and the stock price is at a lower level. The continued active consumption behavior of the affluent consumer group, especially the significant increase in travel spending during Memorial Day; American Express's (AXP.US) data shows that consumer spending on air travel is accelerating; the momentum of the service industry exceeds that of commodity sales; and the strong performance of existing home sales further demonstrates excellent performance in the high-end market.
Helfstein gave a target price of $90, expecting a 28.5% increase in the next 12 months. The consensus rating on Wall Street is a strong buy, based on 29 buy recommendations and one hold recommendation, with an average target price of $87.86, and an expected upside potential of 25.5% within a year.
Snowflake (SNOW.US)
Snowflake is a software company that provides a cloud-based data analytics platform. The company provides data-as-a-service convenience to customers with its high-end data capabilities and subscription model. By integrating all services on a single platform, Snowflake eliminates data silos, providing a streamlined and efficient data architecture solution for enterprises of different sizes.
With the rise of generative artificial intelligence, Snowflake quickly captured the opportunity for business expansion. The company recognizes that artificial intelligence is highly dependent on data, and Snowflake's data cloud has unique advantages in providing basic services. The scalability and flexibility of its platform optimize data storage, access, and management, while achieving a perfect combination of adaptability and interoperability. In March of this year, Snowflake announced a collaboration with Nvidia to further strengthen its leading position in technology by combining its secure AI data cloud with Nvidia's full-stack accelerator technology.
Currently, Snowflake has more than 9,800 customers who rely on Snowflake to unify their data sources. These customers perform more than 5 billion data queries and run more than 515 million workloads on the data cloud every day. As of April 30th, the company has 485 customers with an annual revenue of over $1 million and $5 billion in remaining performance obligations, with a market cap of $42.5 billion.
In terms of financial performance, Snowflake reported a total revenue of $828.7 million in the first quarter of 2025 fiscal year, a year-on-year growth of 33%, exceeding expectations by $42.8 million. The product revenue reached $789.6 million, a year-on-year growth of 34%. Despite the non-GAAP EPS of 14 cents, down one cent from the previous year and lower than expected EPS, Itay Kidron, a five-star analyst at Oppenheimer, remains optimistic about Snowflake's prospects, especially in the field of artificial intelligence. Kidron believes that Snowflake's innovative capabilities have been demonstrated through its constantly expanding product features, and may inspire customers to build applications on its platform for the long term.
Kidron gave Snowflake a "outperform (buy)" rating and set a target price of $220, expecting the stock price to rise by 73% within a year. Although Oppenheimer's view is more optimistic than the analyst consensus, of the 35 recent comments, 25 recommended buying, 8 holding, and 1 selling, with a consensus rating of moderate buy. The average target price of $201.74 implies a potential upside of 58.5% in the next year, demonstrating the market's high expectations for Snowflake's future development.