The July 7 tape saw chip strength cool after two strong sessions to open the quarter, but sell-side desks stayed busy. Behind Chair Kevin Warsh's June 17 FOMC hold at 3.50%–3.75% and a CME FedWatch reading still assigning roughly an 80% probability to zero rate cuts through year-end 2026, the bar has shifted toward names with fundamental catalysts rather than macro tailwinds. Q2 earnings season begins in earnest next week, and Tuesday's slate of research calls surfaced five names with fresh Buy signals worth watching into Thursday, July 9.
Cloudflare (NET) — Scotiabank flips bullish with a fresh Street-high target
Cloudflare runs the internet's most widely deployed edge network, providing content delivery, security, and an increasingly distributed compute platform through Workers AI. On July 7, Scotiabank analyst Patrick Colville upgraded the stock from Sector Perform to Sector Outperform and lifted his price target from $225 to $300, a Street-high figure that drove an 8.89% one-day gain. Colville wrote, "We upgrade our rating on the common shares of Cloudflare to Sector Outperform and lift our price target to $300," citing accelerating AI workload traffic and improving pricing on newer Workers tiers. His call adds to a run of positive revisions since April, when Piper Sandler's James Fish moved to Overweight.
Shares closed at $269.55 on July 7, up 8.89%, with a market cap of $95.7 billion and a trailing P/E of 266.88 reflecting the AI-infrastructure growth premium. The 52-week range is $158.83 to $276.81. The consensus rating is Buy, with 9 of 14 analysts bullish, an average target of $246.36, a median of $255, a high of $300 (the new Scotiabank mark), and a low of $140. The valuation leaves little room for a Q2 revenue miss.
Risks: Multiple compression if AI infrastructure spending decelerates; competition from Fastly, Akamai, and hyperscaler native edge offerings; Guggenheim's John Difucci maintains a Sell at $140, less than half of Scotiabank's; and any softening in Workers-tier pricing power.
First Solar (FSLR) — Deutsche Bank calls the pullback a buying opportunity
First Solar is the largest US-headquartered thin-film solar manufacturer and a primary Inflation Reduction Act production-credit beneficiary. On July 7, Deutsche Bank analyst Corinne Blanchard upgraded the stock from Hold to Buy and raised her price target from $245 to $272, framing the recent selloff as a "sharp pullback" that has reset the risk-reward. The upgrade implies roughly 17% upside from the July 7 close and follows a July 6 Wells Fargo price-target hike to $320 from $255 by Michael Blum, giving the name back-to-back positive revisions.
Shares closed at $229.34 on July 7, down 1.60%, with a market cap of $24.6 billion and a trailing P/E of 14.82, one of the lowest multiples on this list. The 52-week range is $159.85 to $320.95. The consensus rating is Strong Buy, with 11 of 13 analysts bullish, an average target of $262.15, a median of $260, a high of $330, and a low of $187. The re-rating story combined with IRA credit visibility is a rare setup among growth-hungry industrials.
Risks: Any dilution or delay of IRA Section 45X production credits; module ASP compression from Chinese import competition; project-timing softness at large utility customers; and Jefferies' Julien Dumoulin-Smith continues to carry a Hold at $187.
Repligen (RGEN) — Benchmark upgrade caps a run of positive revisions
Repligen supplies filtration, chromatography, and process analytics equipment used across the biologics manufacturing chain, with meaningful exposure to GLP-1 buildouts and cell and gene therapy scale-up. Benchmark upgraded the stock from Hold to Buy with a $185 target on July 7, echoing an Evercore ISI price-target hike to $160 from $150 by Daniel Markowitz one day earlier on July 6. The two-day cluster follows an April stretch when Canaccord's Kyle Mikson had trimmed his target to $145, so the tape is shifting.
Shares closed at $139.53 on July 7, down 1.36%, with a market cap of $7.87 billion and a trailing P/E of 77.52. The 52-week range is $100.99 to $175.77. The consensus rating is Strong Buy, with 7 of 8 analysts bullish, an average target of $170.38, a median of $162.50, a high of $208 (HC Wainwright's Raghuram Selvaraju), and a low of $145. The Benchmark $185 target reflects growing conviction that biologics tooling demand has bottomed after two years of destocking.
Risks: Bioprocessing capex cycles can be lumpy; large-pharma order pushouts around GLP-1 capacity ramps; concentration risk in the top handful of contract-manufacturing customers; and Canaccord Genuity's Kyle Mikson maintains a Hold at $145.
Waste Management (WM) — CIBC upgrade reinforces the recycling and renewable-energy thesis
Waste Management is the largest solid-waste and recycling operator in North America, with the Stericycle medical-waste business now contributing meaningfully to segment revenue. CIBC upgraded the stock from Neutral to Outperform with a $244 target on July 7, joining a run of firms that turned bullish through early 2026 including UBS's Jon Windham, who moved to Buy in January. Shares finished up 3.73% on the day, one of the session's strongest large-cap defensive moves.
Shares closed at $237.53 on July 7 with a market cap of $95.4 billion, a trailing P/E of 31.09, and a dividend yield near 1%. The 52-week range is $194.11 to $248.13, so shares are trading near annual highs. The consensus rating is Strong Buy, with 10 of 13 analysts bullish, an average target of $258.62, a median of $260, a high of $275 (TD Cowen's James Schumm), and a low of $230. Recurring pricing, Stericycle synergy runway, and landfill-gas-to-renewable-natural-gas monetization give management multiple levers into 2027.
Risks: Stericycle integration slippage relative to the multi-year synergy guide; RIN pricing volatility that can swing landfill-gas economics quarter to quarter; construction-related volume softness in commercial collection; and Morgan Stanley's Jeffrey Goldstein maintains an Equal-Weight rating with a $230 target below the current price.
Shopify (SHOP) — Bank of America reinstates Buy on the merchant platform
Shopify runs the leading independent e-commerce platform for small and mid-market merchants, with a growing enterprise footprint through Shopify Plus and rising take-rate from Shop Pay. Bank of America reinstated coverage with a Buy rating and a $150 target on July 7, a meaningful signal after coverage had gone quiet in the spring. The reinstatement joins a Citigroup Buy at $156 from Tyler Radke and a Needham reiterated Buy at $180 from Scott Berg, adding a fresh bull ahead of Q2 results.
Shares closed at $122.73 on July 7, up 2.16%, with a market cap of $159.3 billion and a trailing P/E of 81.28. The 52-week range is $94 to $182.19. The consensus rating is Strong Buy, with 9 of 12 analysts bullish, an average target of $150.08, a median of $150, a high of $180 (Needham's Scott Berg), and a low of $126. The BofA reinstatement places the sell-side average right at the new BofA mark, positioning the Q2 print as the near-term catalyst.
Risks: Consumer-spending softness that flows through to gross merchandise volume; competitive intensity from Amazon Multi-Channel Fulfillment and TikTok Shop for the small-merchant segment; margin volatility if the company reinvests aggressively behind AI merchant tools; and Barclays' Trevor Young holds an Equal-Weight rating with a $126 target near the current price.
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