The businesses aren’t necessarily broken. But each one has a major risk hanging over the stock that investors still need answered before they’re willing to give it more credit. Some of those fears may be justified. Others might be creating opportunity. Here’s what’s keeping each stock stuck: 1/5 — $ADBE The risk: AI disruption Adobe just reported another strong quarter: Revenue +13% YoY Customer Group subscription revenue +14% AI-first ARR +150%+ Yet the stock remains beaten down. The question isn’t whether Adobe is growing today. It’s whether generative AI strengthens Adobe’s ecosystem or eventually makes portions of it easier to replace. Until the market gets a clearer answer, that uncertainty continues hanging over the multiple. 2/5 — $UBER The risk: Autonomous vehicles This is probably my favorite disconnect on the list. Q2 Gross Bookings grew 24% reported, 22% constant currency. Trips grew 18%. Adjusted EBITDA grew 33%. TTM free cash flow surpassed $10B. The business keeps getting stronger. But the stock continues fighting the same question: Does AV make Uber more valuable as the marketplace connecting riders with autonomous fleets... Or does it eventually cut Uber out? I remain firmly in the first camp, but the market clearly hasn’t settled that debate yet. 3/5 — $NKE The risk: Can the turnaround actually restore growth? In the latest quarter: Revenue fell 1%. NIKE Direct fell 7%. Digital fell 12%. Wholesale grew 4%. Greater China remains weak while competition has become much stronger. There are signs of improvement, but investors still need evidence that Elliott Hill can return Nike to durable growth. Nike doesn’t need investors to be reminded how powerful the brand is. It needs the numbers to prove the turnaround is working. 4/5 — $CELH The risk: Can the core CELSIUS brand start growing again? The headline numbers don’t tell the whole story. Total Q2 revenue grew 11%. Alani Nu retail sales grew nearly 56%. But CELSIUS brand revenue fell roughly 12% and retail sales declined 2%. At the same time, Celsius is integrating Alani Nu and Rockstar, optimizing SKUs, increasing promotions and moving the portfolio through Pepsi’s distribution system. The portfolio is becoming much larger. Now investors need proof the original CELSIUS brand can regain momentum too. 5/5 — $UPS The risk: Can UPS come out stronger after intentionally shrinking volume? UPS has spent the last 18 months reducing Amazon volume and restructuring its network around that change. And there are signs the strategy is working. Q2 U.S. Domestic revenue grew 6% while revenue per piece increased 9.3%. International revenue per piece jumped 18.9%. UPS is essentially choosing higher-quality revenue over chasing every package. Now the question is whether better pricing, healthcare, SMB and premium volume can create enough earnings growth to offset the volume it intentionally walked away from.
I think with ADBE, even if they keep growing at 10% ish the market still won’t jump in, I think it will get a permanent revaluation lower, and sadly end up like PayPal just on a dead float
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