By Sam Boughedda
Roku (NASDAQ:ROKU) shares were upgraded to Hold from Sell at Pivotal Research Group on Thursday, with the price target kept at $60 per share.
An analyst at the firm explained that the firm upgraded the stock as the shares have reached a level that they view as "properly balancing risk/reward," and they would take profit on short positions.
"There was no change to our estimates or our $60 YE’22 target price. Our Pivotal broad economic/market view has changed somewhat given recent encouraging news on inflation making a “soft landing” more realistic (but not our base case)," wrote the analyst.
The analyst added that their still relatively cautious rating is driven by the fact that Roku appears to be getting hit materially harder than its advertising peers, the fact that they view the current ad environment negatively and believe it is likely to get worse before it gets better, and the company "massively" ramping its spend.
"Against what we view as a more encouraging backdrop and a retrenchment in the valuation we no longer view ROKU as a fundamental short at current valuation levels," concluded the analyst.