Monday, January 20, 2020

The Zacks Research Daily presents the best research output of our analyst team. Today's Research Daily features new research reports on 16 major stocks, including Alphabet (GOOGL), JPMorgan Chase (JPM) and Comcast (CMCSA). These research reports have been hand-picked from the roughly 70 reports published by our analyst team today.

You can see all of today’s research reports here >>>

Alphabet’s shares have outperformed the Zacks Internet Services industry over the past year (+33.7% vs. +13.5%). The Zacks analyst believes that Alphabet is driven by robust search business. Its strong focus on innovation of AI techniques and the home automation space should aid business growth in the long term.

Also, its strong focus on bolstering presence in the cloud market is encouraging. The company’s strong initiatives toward elimination of bad ads and introducing useful major search updates are tailwinds.

Notably, it has agreed to acquire Fitbit for roughly $2.1 billion. This deal will likely help the company to accelerate innovation in the wearables category. However, the company’s growing heavy investments, litigation issues and competition might hurt profitability. 

(You can read the full research report on Alphabet here >>>)

Shares of JPMorgan have gained +11.9% in the past three months against the Zacks Major Regional Banks Services industry's rise of +8.1%. The Zacks analyst believes that decent loan demand, improving economy, the acquisition of InstaMed, new branch openings and focus on credit card business will continue to aid financials. 

The bank has an impressive earnings surprise history, having surpassed the Zacks Consensus Estimate in each of the trailing four quarters. Improvement in non-interest income and lower provisions supported fourth-quarter 2019 results, while decline in net interest income was an undermining factor.

While the Fed’s accommodative policy, challenges in expanding mortgage operations and the company’s significant dependence on capital markets revenues make us apprehensive about top-line growth to some extent, enhanced capital deployment plan reflects strong balance sheet position and will enhance shareholder value.

(You can read the full research report on JPMorgan here >>>)

Comcast’s shares have gained +8.3% over the past six months against the Zacks Cable Television industry's rise of +9.4%. The Zacks analyst believes that Comcast is benefiting from solid growth in a number of residential and business services high-speed Internet customers.

The company’s strategy of providing high-speed Internet at an affordable cost plays a key role in improving customer experience. Growing popularity of Xfinity products is also a key catalyst. Moreover, expansion in the wireless user base and the security and automation services customer base is a growth driver.

Additionally, Sky’s content strength is expected to drive the subscriber base in Europe. Further, increasing digital video sales hold promise. However, Comcast continues to lose video subscribers due to cord cutting. Moreover, a high debt level is a headwind. 

(You can read the full research report on Comcast here >>>)

Other noteworthy reports we are featuring today include Amgen (AMGN), International Business Machines (IBM) and QUALCOMM (QCOM).

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Sheraz Mian

Director of Research

Note: Sheraz Mian heads the Zacks Equity Research department and is a well-regarded expert of aggregate earnings. He is frequently quoted in the print and electronic media and publishes the weekly Earnings Trends and Earnings Preview reports. If you want an email notification each time Sheraz publishes a new article, please click here>>>