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Citizens upgrades this cloud computing stock on hyperscale outsourcing optimism

Citizens upgrades this cloud computing stock on hyperscale outsourcing optimism

Shares of CoreWeave could see a sizable boost in the coming months as demand for hyperscalers ramps up, Citizens JMP Securities said on Tuesday. Analyst Greg Miller upgraded the provider of cloud infrastructure for artificial intelligence workloads to market outperform from market perform and set a new, 2-month price target at $180, implying more than 49% upside from Monday’s close. CoreWeave surged more than 7% Monday after the company said it won an order worth at least $6.3 billion from Nvidia, the dominant maker of semiconductors that run artificial intelligence, which also probably “suggests more to come,” Miller said. The stock is up more than 20% in the past month. “Since launching coverage of CoreWeave, we have consistently highlighted that we believe most investors involved in the stock are not fully aware of how the company generates its revenue, nor do they fully understand the risks associated with the long-term nature of the business model,” the Citizens analyst wrote. “With an ~30.0% downdraft in the share price after the company’s second earnings report and new expectations for 2H25 margin compression, we believe investor sensitivity remains high.” “Even so, we think the wave of incremental outsourcing by hyperscalers will overwhelm potential negatives in the near term,” Miller said. CRWV 1M mountain CRWV, 1-month Miller sees more upside ahead before long-term pressures emerge for the Graphics Processing Unit as a Service ( GPUaaS) industry in general and CoreWeave in particular. GPUs are the central processors used to power AI. Miller projects that the GPUaaS business will likely grow to $300 billion by 2030 from $3 to $4 billion in 2025. “With an RPO increase that appears to be more than simply a shift of OpenAI’s business from Microsoft (considering Microsoft does not appear to have slowed), we believe the sharp acceleration in RPO at Oracle represents a harbinger of things to come,” Miller wrote, referring to remaining performance obligations, a key financial yardstick. “With the desire to reduce balance sheet risk, mitigate technology risk and speed time to market, we believe it is now clear that hyperscale customers will significantly increase the practice of having other companies deploy clusters and lease back to them.” “CoreWeave is likely to benefit from the increased visibility of GPU supply and the associated demand emanating from its largest customers,” Miller said. A majority of analysts are less than enthusiastic on CoreWeave, with 15 of 26 rating it no more than a hold, according to LSEG data. Another eight rate CoreWeave a buy or strong buy.