Benzinga's Bulls & Bears Of The Week: Apple, Alibaba, Spotify, 3M And More

• Benzinga has featured looks at many investor favorite stocks over the past week.
• Bullish calls included the iPhone maker and a couple of top industrials.
• Bearish calls included the leading electric car maker and other consumer product outfits.

The broader equity markets are still trading in the same neighborhood, despite largely solid first-quarter results and even some positive surprises. Benzinga has continued to feature looks at the prospects for many investor favorite stocks. Here are just a few of this past week's most bullish and bearish posts that may be worth another look.

Bulls

In an 'Amazing Business': Buffett Buys 75M More Apple Shares In Q1" by Jayson Derrick, reads why the Oracle of Omaha thinks Apple Inc. AAPL investors are missing the point when they focus on iPhone sales. 

In "Citron Says Alibaba Is 'On Its Way To $250'," Elizabeth Balboa examines why Alibaba Group Holding Ltd BABA, the most compelling growth story in the market, is also the world's most heavily shorted stock.

Wayne Duggan's "Barclays Upgrades Nvidia, Says AI Opportunity Is Too Big To Ignore" presents the case that its leading position in artificial intelligence makes NVIDIA Corporation NVDA a buy.

The retreat in the shares of conglomerate 3M Co MMM over the past four months has created a potentially attractive entry point, says a key analyst in Bill Haddad's "RBC: 3M Remains One Of The Strongest Industrials."

In Shanthi Rexaline's "Jefferies: Alcoa's Valuation Will Benefit From Balance Sheet Improvement, Capital Returns," see why the leaner and meaner Alcoa Corp AA picked up a sell-side bull this past week.

Also have a look at "Why Cannabis Investors Are Eyeing South America."

Bears

"How Tesla Analysts Reacted To Elon Musk's 'Bonehead' Remarks: 'Most Unusual Call I Have Ever Experienced'" by Elizabeth Balboa looks at the consequences of the Tesla Inc TSLA CEO's recent petulance.

In Jayson Derrick's "Analyst: Spotify Is A Great Product, But Not A Great Stock," see why Buckingham Research Group believes Spotify Technology SA SPOT needs to generate growth beyond current expectations in order to warrant a bullish stance. 

Find out what made one top analyst cautious on Colgate-Palmolive Company CL in "Morgan Stanley Shifts To Neutral On Colgate-Palmolive, Cites Emerging Markets Weakness" by Shanthi Rexaline.

In "Analyst: Cummins' Earnings Visibility Clouded By Overhang, Peaking End Markets," Bill Haddad takes a look at uncertainty related to a $187-million charge that Cummins Inc. CMI reported in the first quarter.

Brett Hershman's "Ulta's Valuation Pushes This Bull To The Sidelines" examines the prospects for Ulta Beauty Inc ULTA in terms of fundamentals and valuation, focusing on the "law of large numbers."

Be sure to check out "3 Finance Books To Read At The Beach This Summer" as well.

At the time of this writing, the author had no position in the mentioned equities.

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