Stocks kicked off the first day of the fourth quarter with a sell-off, and the geopolitical story is still weighing on stocks on Wednesday. The markets are dealing with an escalated Iran-Israel situation and a U.S. port strike right before earnings season and the election, while the Federal Reserve’s rate-cutting campaign and Chinese bank stimulus are acting as counterbalances.

Investors and traders alike are looking for new ideas to be positioned for the coming months and into 2025. Tactical Bulls searches the daily flow of analyst calls covering the upgrades and downgrades from Wall Street looking for new ideas in Wall Street research reports. These analyst calls can be a reliable source for finding some of those new ideas that might have otherwise been overlooked or missed.

Short-term traders get a glimpse of immediate price reactions to news and to the analyst calls. Long-term investors get a picture of new buy, sell and hold ratings with targets looking a year out.

Tactical Bulls would always remind its readers and all investors that no single analyst report should ever be used as the sole reason to buy or sell a stock. The decision to buy, sell or hold needs to be made by each investor along with their financial advisor.

These are some of the top analyst upgrades and downgrades seen on Wednesday, October 2, 2024.

Allurion Technologies, Inc. (NYSE: ALUR) was started with a Buy rating and was assigned a $2.00 price target at TD Cowen. Allurion was a $0.58 stock with only a $37 million market cap at the prior close.

Archer Daniels Midland (NYSE: ADM) was reiterated as Hold at Argus, looking for a more favorable entry point. While the accounting issue appears to be nearly resolved, the independent research firm sees ADM as no longer on track to achieve its long-term financial goals.

Charles River Laboratories International, Inc. (NYSE: CRL) was downgraded to Neutral from Buy and its price objective was cut to $215 from $250 at BofA Securities. Charles River Labs closed down 1.5% at $194.08 ahead of the call and was down an additional 1.2% at $191.75 in early trading indications.

Domino’s Pizza, Inc. (NYSE: DPZ) was reiterated as Overweight and its price target was raised to $520 from $515 at Morgan Stanley, with the firm noting that any trimmed numbers in the coming earnings report is more a function of the industry than any real change in the Domino’s story.

GE Vernova (NYSE: GEV) was downgraded to Hold from Buy and the prior $190 price target was removed by Raymond James, noting that the stock is overcrowded and needs to consolidate after a 50% gain-plus gain in about three months.

Harley-Davidson, Inc. (NYSE: HOG) was downgraded to Neutral from Outperform and its price target was cut to $40 from $44 (versus $38.02 prior close) at R.W. Baird.

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The Home Depot, Inc. (NYSE: HD) was raised to Buy from Accumulate with a $450 target price (versus $409.05 prior close) at Gordon Haskett.

Kellanova Co. (NYSE: K) was downgraded to Hold from Buy at Argus, with the company previously known as Kellogg being acquired by Mars at $83.50 per share being close enough to its prior $80 target.

McCormick & Company, Inc. (NYSE: MKC) was reiterated with a Buy rating and its price objective was raised to $96 from $95 (versus $84.09 prior close) at BofA Securities.

Moody’s Corporation (NYSE: MCO) was started with an Outperform rating and $521 price target (versus $471.40 prior close) at Evercore ISI.

MSCI Inc. (NYSE: MSCI) was started with an Outperform rating and $690 price target (versus $575.75 prior close) at Evercore ISI.

NIKE, Inc. (NYSE: NKE) was last seen down 7.5% at $82.50 after withdrawing guidance and stopping an investor day presentation for its new CEO to take over. Nike was maintained with a Buy rating but its price objective was lowered to $100 from $104 at BofA Securities. Morgan Stanley maintained its Equal-Weight rating with a $82 price target on NIKE.

PVH Corporation (NYSE: PVH) was downgraded to Neutral from Buy and its price objective was cut to $107 from $130 at BofA Securities. PVH closed down over 3% at $97.64 ahead of the call on Tuesday and was indicated down another 2.1% at $95.55 on Wednesday.

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Salesforce, Inc. (NYSE: CRM) was raised to Outperform from Market Perform and its price target was raised to $400 from $270 (versus $270.87 prior close) at Northland Capital Markets.

S&P Global, Inc. (NYSE: SPGI) was started with an Outperform rating and $599 price target (versus $512.22 prior close) at Evercore ISI.

Sphere Entertainment Co. (NYSE: SPHR) was raised to Outperform from Peer Perform with a $60 price target (versus $43.84 prior close) at Wolfe Research.

Tandem Diabetes Care, Inc. (NASDAQ: TNDM) was started with an Outperform rating and a $65 target price at RBC Capital Markets. Tandem Diabetes Care shares closed down 3.16% at $41.07 ahead of the call on Tuesday and its shares were indicated up 3.5% at $42.50 on Wednesday morning.

Tempus AI, inc. (NASDAQ: TEM) was downgraded to Neutral from Buy but its price objective was raised to $60 from $45 at BofA Securities. Tempus AI shares closed down over 6% at $53.07 on Tuesday and was indicated down 2.5% more at $51.75 on Wednesday.

If you missed out on Tuesday’s top analyst calls, they were in shares of Alphabet, AT&T, Cameco, Ford, Lululemon, Meta, Netflix, Trade Desk and many more stocks.