Cisco screens as clear leader in Morgan Stanley VAR survey

Analyst
โดย Investing.com·Read original
Summary · why it matters

Cisco Systems continues to screen as the clear leader in Morgan Stanley's second-quarter survey of value-added resellers, with average growth expectations rising to 3.0% from 0.6% in the prior survey. Analyst Meta Marshall reiterated an Overweight rating and a $130 price target, noting that 43% of VARs identified Cisco as best positioned to capture incremental AI and data center modernization spending over the next 12 months, ahead of Nvidia and white-box or specialist networking vendors at 30%. Cisco's networking pipeline strengthened, with 67% of VARs expecting sales to increase, up from 48%, pushing the net pipeline score to +60% from +39%. Growth expectations broadened across both segments, with campus-led growth expectations rising to 17% from 3% and data center expectations increasing to 20% from 13%. Refresh activity is translating into purchases, as 30% of VARs reported customers had recently completed a Catalyst 9000 switching refresh, up from 6%, with security cited as the leading refresh driver at 53%, versus 29% previously. Security sales expectations also improved, with 70% of VARs expecting an increase, up from 45% a year earlier, lifting the net pipeline score to +63% from +39%. Sentiment around Splunk, which Cisco acquired, improved, with 33% of VARs reporting customers are positive and purchasing more, up from 20%, while the share reporting purchasing declines eased to 7% from 10%. Marshall said the results reinforce durable demand and improving wallet share, supporting the Overweight rating.

Impact on stocks 2

Artificial Intelligence▲ · 2 stocks

Theme Impact 3

Off-coverage companies 1

Splunk Inc.Private± Mixed
relevance

Related news

IREN Fair Value Trimmed to US$79.03 as AI Cloud Wins Meet Build Out Risks

IREN's fair value estimate has been trimmed from US$80.93 to US$79.03, a modest adjustment reflecting a mix of growing AI cloud contracts and ongoing questions around execution and supply build out through 2027. The revision lifts revenue growth assumptions to 168.01% from 125.79% and net profit margin expectations to 11.73% from 5.79%, while the future P/E assumption drops to 31.26x from 90.29x and the discount rate rises to 9.41% from 8.83%. On the bullish side, JPMorgan shifted IREN from Underweight to Overweight with a US$65 price target, citing a partnership with Nvidia, new customer signings and higher industry pricing, while H.C. Wainwright raised its target to US$90 after IREN announced US$2.8b of new multi year AI cloud contracts and lifted its 2026 AI cloud annual recurring revenue target to more than US$4b. Northland initiated IREN at Outperform with a US$99 price target, and Freedom Capital upgraded the stock from Hold to Buy. Freedom Capital nonetheless flagged execution on supply additions over the next two years as a central risk, noting the story depends heavily on adding capacity on schedule.
IREN ▲JPM ▲
Artificial Intelligence ▲Cloud & Digital Infrastructure
Simply Wall St·9hRead more →
impact 4

Nvidia-Backed Nscale Files for US IPO After $1.02 Billion Loss

Nscale, the London-based AI data center developer backed by Nvidia and Microsoft, filed publicly for an initial public offering in New York, seeking to raise as much as $3 billion. The company reported a net loss of $1.02 billion on revenue of $140.6 million for the six months ended June 30, compared with a net loss of $368.9 million on revenue of $10.4 million a year earlier, according to its Friday filing with the US Securities and Exchange Commission. Spun off from a cryptocurrency mining operation in early 2024, Nscale was valued at about $14.6 billion in a March Series C round led by Aker ASA and 8090 Industries, with Nvidia and Nokia Oyj also participating. The company has agreed to add more than 30,000 Nvidia chips to an existing rental agreement with Microsoft at its Narvik, Norway gigafactory, and Anthropic has agreed to spend $45 billion to rent AI cloud computing power from its flagship West Virginia data center development. The offering is being led by Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan Chase and Morgan Stanley, with shares expected to trade on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol NSCL.
NVDA ▲MSFT ▲GS ▲JPM ▲MS ▲0MJX.LSE
Artificial Intelligence ▲Cloud & Digital Infrastructure
Bloomberg·10hRead more →
▲2

Tigress Analyst Raises Alphabet Price Target to Street-High $485

Tigress Financial Partners analyst Ivan Feinseth reiterated a Strong Buy rating on Alphabet and raised his price target to a Street-high $485 from $415, implying roughly 39.6% upside. The bullish thesis centers on Alphabet turning its massive AI investments into growth across Search, Cloud and Gemini, with Feinseth arguing AI Overviews and AI Mode can make Google more useful for complex, high-intent queries. Recent results support that argument: Alphabet's second-quarter revenue rose 24% from a year earlier to $119.8 billion, Search and Other revenue increased 17%, YouTube advertising grew 13%, and operating income climbed 30% to $40.77 billion. Google Cloud revenue surged 82% to $24.8 billion, operating income more than tripled to $8.8 billion, margins reached 35.6%, and its $514 billion backlog gives visibility into future enterprise demand. Gemini has reached 950 million monthly active users, more than 9 million monthly developers and roughly 22 billion API tokens processed per minute, and Feinseth sees monetization opportunities across subscriptions, APIs, enterprise software, agents and productivity products, though the risk remains that Alphabet must prove its enormous AI spending generates sufficient returns.
GEMIGOOG
Cloud & Digital Infrastructure ▲Artificial Intelligence ▲
GuruFocus·11hRead more →
© 2026 MarketDXNews