Barron's : Ferrari’s EV Reveal: A Top for the Stock? Sizing Up Thursday’s Plunge

Ferrari’s EV Reveal: A Top for the Stock? Sizing Up Thursday’s Plunge.
The luxe car maker unveiled its first electric vehicle amid great fanfare. Why the stock fell 16%.

Key Points
  • Ferrari unveiled its first electric model, the Elettrica, along with financial projections that caused its shares to fall 15.8%.
  • The Elettrica boasts 1,000 horsepower and a range of at least 329 miles, but its success hinges on appealing to traditional Ferrari enthusiasts.
  • Ferrari plans to invest 4.7 billion euros between 2026 and 2030 in electrification, facing challenges similar to other luxury automakers.

MARANELLO, Italy— Ferrari gave investors a glimpse of its first electric model on Wednesday, at a presentation here that felt more like something out of the Tron sci-fi franchise than a luxury launch event.

Laser beams and pounding industrial music accompanied Ferrari’s reveal of the Elettrica’s chassis, motor, and battery pack, as well as a built-in system that amplifies the sounds of the electric engine in a bid to replicate the feeling that drivers get when they hear the visceral roar of a traditional supercar.

For investors, however, there was only the sound of a plunging stock.

The problem was that Ferrari also unveiled its financial projections for the rest of this decade, and they were lower than expected. The Milan-listed shares fell 15.8% on Thursday, to 354 euros ($409), the largest one-day decline since the company went public in October 2015. That could mark the end of a run-up that saw the shares more than double in the three years through Wednesday. They’re now down about 15% for the year.

The long-awaited Elettrica is emerging as a symbol of the road ahead—both the obstacles and the unknowns.

The cars are being manufactured in-house at a brand new “e-building” in Maranello, the northern Italian city that Ferrari calls home. Anyone who wants to see more will have to wait until spring 2026, when the company plans to lift the hood on what the finished model will look like and cost.

There’s a lot riding on whether Ferrari enthusiasts, who’ve helped transform the car maker into Europe’s most valuable auto company, buy in. The company, with a market value of $76.5 billion, scaled back its previous guidance about electrification at a Capital Markets Day on Thursday but still expects 20% of its lineup to be electric by 2030.

The case for electrification relies on there being an undertapped market of would-be buyers—wealthy people who care about the planet too much to want to drive a supercar powered by a traditional internal combustion engine.

“Luxury EVs are still a young and immature category,” says Brian Lum, an investment manager at Baillie Gifford. “It’s important to build that next generation of Ferraristi, and electrification should help them to do that.” Baillie Gifford holds about 4.3 million Ferrari shares, a position that was valued at about $2.1 billion as of Wednesday’s close.

The raw stats also look impressive. At 1,000 horsepower, the Elettrica offers as much power output as any other top-end Ferrari, and a top speed of more than 192 miles an hour is in line with most of the company’s existing models. After a single charging session, the car will be able to drive at least 329 miles, which ought to combat some customers’ range anxiety.

But Ferrari’s entire business model hinges on cachet. The Prancing Horse’s customers are willing to fork out millions of dollars to make repeat purchases because of the perception that its supercars are best-in-class. If the EV rollout doesn’t go to plan, it could undermine that brand.

It remains to be seen whether the amplified engine noises win over fans that already own dozens of traditional, gas-guzzling Ferraris. And like other EVs, the Elettrica won’t have gears—instead, paddles on the steering wheel will enable drivers to adjust power delivery and torque, and switch among three driving modes.

“I’m strongly against fake engine sounds….In every case, I’ve found it very tacky,” Luc Poirier, a Canadian real estate investor who currently owns 34 Ferraris and plans to add more to his collection, tells Barron’s ahead of the EV reveal. “To me, it takes away from the purity of the driving experience and feels artificial, almost like a gimmick.”

Even after Thursday’s stock tumble, investors are paying up for Ferrari. The shares trade at 38 times estimated earnings for the next 12 months, high for a company whose projected earnings growth has fallen to just 5.5% a year through 2030. It’s higher than BMW’s multiple of 7.3, Porsche’s, and luxe standard-bearer LVMH Moët Hennessy Louis Vuitton’s 24.

Investors could well lose some ardor for Ferrari if it can’t get the electric rollout right.

Earlier this year, the company’s board warned that the Elettrica may not sell at Ferrari’s typical lofty margins, so it could be partly to blame for the soft guidance.

There are costs attached to the electric pivot, too: Ferrari has dipped into its pockets to construct the Maranello e-building, and expects cumulative expenditures of €4.7 billion from 2026 to 2030 as it ups its innovation efforts. Unless the company can wow investors with its EV pricing, the Elettrica could weigh on the stock for some time.

This isn’t just a Ferrari problem. Other high-end auto makers also have struggled to reposition their businesses in the EV era.

Porsche gave its fourth profit warning of the year on Sept. 19, saying that volatile demand would force it to delay the launch of a long-awaited all-electric vehicle. It said it expects to take a €1.8 billion hit from rescheduling a platform for EVs in the 2030s, and cut its guidance for its profit margin for 2025 to 2%, down from 5% to 7% previously. Shares tumbled 7%.

Lamborghini and McLaren have also said over the past year that they would delay plans to launch electric models, citing weak demand.

Ferrari has long been the gold standard for luxury auto makers. Since 1947, Maranello has always been careful to maintain its heritage, keeping tight control of shipments in a strategy that founder Enzo Ferrari often described as always delivering “one less car than the market demands.”

But if the Prancing Horse can’t drum up enough demand to make the Elettrica a hit, then perhaps its stock has run out of road.

Barron's : Dell Is Just Beginning to Tell Its AI Story. Buy the Stock.

Dell Is Just Beginning to Tell Its AI Story. Buy the Stock.
The company is transforming itself into a growth stock but not being treated as one by the market.

Key Points
  • Dell’s infrastructure solutions group reported 44% sales growth year over year in the second quarter, driven by AI server demand.
  • The company projects over $20 billion in AI server sales this year, positioning it as a leader in the growing AI market.
  • Dell’s shares trade at 13.5 times expected earnings, significantly lower than the S&P 500’s 22 times, despite anticipated 16% EPS growth.

Dell Technologies is becoming a high-growth company—and its stock is extremely cheap.

This is no longer your father’s Dell, which made only PCs. The company has been growing its business manufacturing servers, which are a crucial component in the high-growth artificial-intelligence industry. Its legacy PC business, meanwhile, can stabilize and continue to produce steady cash flows.

If it all comes together, the stock could surge. The upside is substantial, considering Dell is still priced for slow growth.

Dell’s transformation to a growth stock starts with the AI business. Its infrastructure solutions group, which accounts for all non-PC business, reported sales growth of 44% year over year, to $16.8 billion, in the second quarter. The servers and networking subsegment, meanwhile, grew by 69%, reflecting increased demand for AI servers.

Companies are already spending more than $100 billion each year on AI servers, according to Grand View Research, and should continue to buy more of those products as they build out their data centers to power AI software capabilities. Grand View projects the server business to grow by 39% annually to reach $854 billion by 2030. Jeff Clarke, Dell’s chief operating officer, this week spoke to Barron’s about the company’s servers business.


The company is projecting more than $20 billion in sales from AI servers this year, which would make it among the leaders in the field. Other sizable companies include Hewlett Packard Enterprise, Super Micro Computer, and Lenovo, according to Grand View’s report.

Management said on the second-quarter earnings call in August that its enterprise segment grew by double-digit percentages quarter over quarter, a sign that the growth is still in the early stages. One customer is Elon Musk’s xAI, which reportedly agreed to buy $5 billion worth of Dell servers.

Dell also has other ways beyond AI to juice revenue. Management highlighted the services business at its Oct. 7 investor day. The segment, which represents almost a quarter of total revenue, is part of the company’s long-term strategy to win over customers.

“Dell can complement its AI server with engineering expertise and then financial services,” says Gabelli Funds analyst Hendi Susanto. Dell provides consulting for server replacements, while Dell Financial Services comes in handy when a customer can’t pay out of pocket for a purchase. Gabelli Funds owns Dell shares.

Acquisitions, which Dell has made in the past, could be another source of growth. With more than $8 billion in balance-sheet cash and $7 billion of projected annual free cash flow, Dell could easily buy a smaller server maker. It could also borrow funds to acquire a larger company’s data center unit. That way, it can offer a suite of products that complement each other—and win more business.

The company does have more than $20 billion of debt, but “if there’s a CEO that could actually raise money, it’s Michael Dell,” says Susquehanna Financial analyst Mehdi Hosseini.

And Dell still has its PC business. While it’s true that this segment has lost some market share in recent quarters, analysts are calling for 3% growth next year as Dell benefits from an upgrade cycle that incorporates high-performance AI.

Overall, total company revenue is expected to increase about 9%, to $116.6 billion in 2026, according to FactSet. Management confirmed this figure at its investor day, with long-term annual revenue growth guidance of high single digits. Dell’s operating profit guidance of $9.4 billion for fiscal year 2026, at the midpoint of the range, was greater than the $8.2 billion that analysts had forecast previously. Growing sales of AI servers, with larger margins than the rest of the business, would help profitability.

Larger margins, combined with more than $4 billion in annual share repurchases, can drive earnings per share higher. Analysts expect 18% EPS growth next year.

That type of growth could boost the stock if the market perceives it as sustainable. Dell trades at 14.5 times earnings estimates for the coming 12 months, though that multiple could drop if analysts lift their estimates following investor day. Either way, the stock is cheap compared with the S&P 500’s 22 times forward earnings, to say nothing of the many tech hardware stocks whose revenue is tied to AI. That gap is simply too wide for the potential growth.

There is a caveat to the narrative about long-term growth: heated competition. The risk is that Dell would lose its competitive edge to one of the other server makers. M&A could provide a solution but comes with its own risks. If Dell borrows too much money to buy a company and the deal doesn’t pan out, the stock would get hit hard. The PC business, too, could lose its luster versus competitors.

One potential source of competition could turn into an opportunity. Dominant software companies such as Microsoft, Amazon.com, and Alphabet are trying to make their own AI servers. While they have the cash and the tech expertise to do it, Dell could use that as a chance to pivot to midsize customers, known as the “enterprise” segment. Those companies are still ramping up their adoption of AI servers, and many are large enough to finance these purchases, while some others could go through Dell Financing. This would ultimately result in further growth for Dell.

Dude, you’re getting Dell stock.

Barron's : Dell Is Just Beginning to Tell Its AI Story. Buy the Stock.

Dell Is Just Beginning to Tell Its AI Story. Buy the Stock.
The company is transforming itself into a growth stock but not being treated as one by the market.

Key Points
Dell’s infrastructure solutions group reported 44% sales growth year over year in the second quarter, driven by AI server demand.
The company projects over $20 billion in AI server sales this year, positioning it as a leader in the growing AI market.
Dell’s shares trade at 13.5 times expected earnings, significantly lower than the S&P 500’s 22 times, despite anticipated 16% EPS growth.

Dell Technologies is becoming a high-growth company—and its stock is extremely cheap.

This is no longer your father’s Dell, which made only PCs. The company has been growing its business manufacturing servers, which are a crucial component in the high-growth artificial-intelligence industry. Its legacy PC business, meanwhile, can stabilize and continue to produce steady cash flows.

If it all comes together, the stock could surge. The upside is substantial, considering Dell is still priced for slow growth.

Dell’s transformation to a growth stock starts with the AI business. Its infrastructure solutions group, which accounts for all non-PC business, reported sales growth of 44% year over year, to $16.8 billion, in the second quarter. The servers and networking subsegment, meanwhile, grew by 69%, reflecting increased demand for AI servers.

Companies are already spending more than $100 billion each year on AI servers, according to Grand View Research, and should continue to buy more of those products as they build out their data centers to power AI software capabilities. Grand View projects the server business to grow by 39% annually to reach $854 billion by 2030. Jeff Clarke, Dell’s chief operating officer, this week spoke to Barron’s about the company’s servers business.


The company is projecting more than $20 billion in sales from AI servers this year, which would make it among the leaders in the field. Other sizable companies include Hewlett Packard Enterprise, Super Micro Computer, and Lenovo, according to Grand View’s report.

Management said on the second-quarter earnings call in August that its enterprise segment grew by double-digit percentages quarter over quarter, a sign that the growth is still in the early stages. One customer is Elon Musk’s xAI, which reportedly agreed to buy $5 billion worth of Dell servers.

Dell also has other ways beyond AI to juice revenue. Management highlighted the services business at its Oct. 7 investor day. The segment, which represents almost a quarter of total revenue, is part of the company’s long-term strategy to win over customers.

“Dell can complement its AI server with engineering expertise and then financial services,” says Gabelli Funds analyst Hendi Susanto. Dell provides consulting for server replacements, while Dell Financial Services comes in handy when a customer can’t pay out of pocket for a purchase. Gabelli Funds owns Dell shares.

Acquisitions, which Dell has made in the past, could be another source of growth. With more than $8 billion in balance-sheet cash and $7 billion of projected annual free cash flow, Dell could easily buy a smaller server maker. It could also borrow funds to acquire a larger company’s data center unit. That way, it can offer a suite of products that complement each other—and win more business.

The company does have more than $20 billion of debt, but “if there’s a CEO that could actually raise money, it’s Michael Dell,” says Susquehanna Financial analyst Mehdi Hosseini.

And Dell still has its PC business. While it’s true that this segment has lost some market share in recent quarters, analysts are calling for 3% growth next year as Dell benefits from an upgrade cycle that incorporates high-performance AI.

Overall, total company revenue is expected to increase about 9%, to $116.6 billion in 2026, according to FactSet. Management confirmed this figure at its investor day, with long-term annual revenue growth guidance of high single digits. Dell’s operating profit guidance of $9.4 billion for fiscal year 2026, at the midpoint of the range, was greater than the $8.2 billion that analysts had forecast previously. Growing sales of AI servers, with larger margins than the rest of the business, would help profitability.

Larger margins, combined with more than $4 billion in annual share repurchases, can drive earnings per share higher. Analysts expect 18% EPS growth next year.

That type of growth could boost the stock if the market perceives it as sustainable. Dell trades at 14.5 times earnings estimates for the coming 12 months, though that multiple could drop if analysts lift their estimates following investor day. Either way, the stock is cheap compared with the S&P 500’s 22 times forward earnings, to say nothing of the many tech hardware stocks whose revenue is tied to AI. That gap is simply too wide for the potential growth.

There is a caveat to the narrative about long-term growth: heated competition. The risk is that Dell would lose its competitive edge to one of the other server makers. M&A could provide a solution but comes with its own risks. If Dell borrows too much money to buy a company and the deal doesn’t pan out, the stock would get hit hard. The PC business, too, could lose its luster versus competitors.

One potential source of competition could turn into an opportunity. Dominant software companies such as Microsoft, Amazon.com, and Alphabet are trying to make their own AI servers. While they have the cash and the tech expertise to do it, Dell could use that as a chance to pivot to midsize customers, known as the “enterprise” segment. Those companies are still ramping up their adoption of AI servers, and many are large enough to finance these purchases, while some others could go through Dell Financing. This would ultimately result in further growth for Dell.

Dude, you’re getting Dell stock.

FT : European IPO markets show signs of revival

European IPO markets show signs of revival
Recent string of listings offers hope after prolonged slowdown


European listings are showing signs of a revival as a string of companies launch or prepare initial public offerings, giving hope to the region’s capital markets after a prolonged slowdown.

This week, security services company Verisure raised €3.2bn in the biggest European listing for three years, while prosthetics company Ottobock raised €700mn in Germany’s largest IPO this year.

Swedish digital bank Noba, German automotive company Aumovio, skin laser seller The Beauty Tech Group and classifieds business Swiss Marketplace Group have all listed in Europe in the past few weeks. 

Several more flotations are being planned, including an IPO of €10bn German auto marketplace Mobile.de in Frankfurt, and London listings for tinned food company Princes Group and specialist UK lender Shawbrook.

Company executives and their advisers say geopolitical and economic worries — including market jitters sparked by US tariffs — have eased somewhat, creating a more favourable environment for listings after several IPOs were put on hold.

Stock markets are also trading at record highs, giving further encouragement for companies to list.

“We’re breaking the deadlock,” said Richard Cormack, head of Emea equity capital markets at Goldman Sachs, adding that there was a “good-sized cohort of transactions . . . It feels like now we’re at the proper start of a cycle.”

Martin Thorneycroft, global co-head of equity capital markets at Morgan Stanley, said Verisure’s blockbuster listing “will give a big boost to the large-cap, high-quality assets in the pipeline”.

European stock exchanges have been struggling to attract new listings: there have been 76 so far this year, the lowest level since 2009, according to Dealogic data.


Private equity firms have held on to companies for longer, rather than bringing them to the market, in the face of subdued demand, while some businesses, such as Swedish fintech Klarna, have chosen to list in the US, lured by higher valuations and deeper capital markets. 

The lack of listings has triggered European policymakers to try to encourage more domestic investment in homegrown businesses and incentivise founders to list businesses in the region. 

Companies listing on Sweden’s Nasdaq stock exchange have raised the most so far this year, at $6.7bn, according to Dealogic, while $1.2bn has been raised on the Frankfurt stock exchange, and the same amount on the Swiss SIX venue.

“It’s encouraging that activity is broadening beyond markets with strong domestic bases like Switzerland and Scandinavia”, said Stephane Gruffat, Deutsche Bank’s global head of equity capital markets syndicate. “We’re now seeing renewed demand in the UK, Germany and Spain — including [from] retail investors.”

FT Lex : Revolut’s address matters more than its CEO’s

Revolut’s address matters more than its CEO’s
The UK government should make sure the fintech stays in the country, even if its founder Nik Storonsky didn’t

Sure, low taxes are not the only reason a person might move to the United Arab Emirates. There is also winter sun and sand-dune quad biking. But a looser approach to taxing enormous wealth probably helps — especially for entrepreneurs facing a potential multibillion pound bill from His Majesty’s Revenue & Customs.

One such is Nik Storonsky, co-founder and chief executive of upstart UK bank Revolut. He is the beneficiary of an Elon Musk-style pay package that, in the hands of a UK resident, could theoretically result in over £5bn in taxes, should all of its targets be hit and the proceeds treated as income.

Storonsky’s decampment to the Middle East may then look, at first glance, like evidence that the UK is chasing away its best and brightest through counter-productive tax policies. Such fears are overblown. Just a few weeks earlier Revolut opened a new 113,000 sq ft London headquarters.

Certainly it would have been preferable, from the UK Treasury’s perspective, if Storonsky stuck around. He reportedly sold more than £150mn worth of shares last year; assuming that was almost all capital gains, it could net the tax authorities more than £36mn. Meanwhile his share-based pay is taxed as income, and therefore at a higher rate, so the bill for his future bonus could be proportionally much larger.


But billionaires are mobile; it isn’t obvious the government could have acted differently. Treating share awards as capital gains would create a giant loophole. The UK’s 24 per cent capital gains rate is higher than the oil-rich UAE — where it is zero — but in line with most international peers.

Anxiety about the very wealthy moving abroad has increased since the UK abolished its non-dom regime, which gave tax advantages to people who were resident in the country but who said their main long-term home was elsewhere. But that would make no difference here, since it only protected foreign assets — not shares and income from a UK company.

The more important objective for the government should be to make sure that Revolut stays put, even if its founder didn’t. The bank paid more than £250mn in UK corporation tax last year, a figure that will rise if it manages to reach Storonsky’s ambitious targets. And that’s before considering the impact of payroll taxes and the multiplier effect created by the consumption habits of well-paid employees.

All told, British banks contributed £25bn in employment taxes in the 2024 tax year, according to industry group UK Finance — more than double the entire take from capital gains tax. If Revolut helps drive that number substantially higher, making it easier for one CEO to sustain a year-round tan — and a low tax bill — would be a price worth paying.

The Information : How Amazon Product Listings Are Evolving as AI Changes Search

How Amazon Product Listings Are Evolving as AI Changes Search

The Takeaway
  • Amazon has used generative AI to refine search for past couple of years
  • Merchants report 15-20% sales increases with AI-friendly listings.
  • Amazon is testing a new metric to measure accuracy of product listings

When ecommerce consultant David Khandrius had to help a client who sold baby strollers write a product listing for Amazon’s website in the past, he typically tried to jam as many words into the listing as possible to ensure Amazon’s search algorithm would capture it. That might result in a convoluted title for a listing, like “travel stroller for beach park super compact airplane overhead.”

Nowadays, though, he said, the title might be “foldable compact travel stroller,” while the description would use conversational phrases like “great for moms on the go” or “take it to the beach, the park, put it in the airplane overhead.” The changes are an example of how product listings on Amazon are evolving in response to artificial intelligence tweaks to Amazon’s search algorithm.

In addition to introducing more conversational language to their product listings, merchants are adding more information about how products are used by consumers and changing the images. The changes can help the listings show up more prominently both in Amazon search and its new AI chatbot, Rufus.

“Everyone used to say, ‘Fit as many as many keywords as you can into your bullets without sounding like gibberish,’” said Khandrius, founder of e-commerce consultancy Peachy.

But that often means listings get packed with a string of similar words that don’t actually provide valuable information to shoppers.

Just as companies focused on how their businesses appear in Google search results are rethinking their approach to search engine optimization, adapting it to Google’s AI-enhanced search results, so are brands adapting to Amazon’s use of AI in its search engine—and its introduction of Rufus.

Amazon says it has been using generative AI to refine its search engine for the past couple of years. It’s been working to make its search engine better understand the shopper’s intentions and focus less on keywords.

Early results of the product listing rewrites are positive. Merchants who have changed their approach have seen increases in sales and traffic, people who advise sellers told The Information. Khandrius said his clients’ sales had risen 15% to 20% since they introduced the new style of listings in the second quarter.

Amazon says using generative AI in search has led to better results that give shoppers more context on the product than previous search methods did. Amazon also says its Rufus AI chatbot can provide more information and context about products than a traditional listing can.

“If you think about how many things in a static product page that you’d be able to discover, maybe there were 20, 30 different attributes that might show up on that page,” said Dharmesh Mehta, vice president of worldwide selling partner services at Amazon.

“I can have a conversation with Rufus, and Rufus knows not just about that product—it knows about frequently asked questions that the manufacturer has buried in their product manual somewhere,” he said. “It knows about 17 similar products and can tell you how to compare and contrast them, and that’s just such a different kind of intelligence someone can get shopping than what they could do before.”

Capturing Context

Amazon also offers AI-powered tools to sellers to help them create more detailed product listing pages, and these AI-generated listing pages on average are higher quality than the product listing pages that had been previously created manually, Mehta said.

The company is also testing changes to how it assesses the accuracy of its product listings, which is important for its business. In the latest issue of Harvard Business Review, an Amazon economist, an Amazon engineer and a Harvard Business School professor co-authored a paper that noted customers were more likely to buy a product when the written description seemed to match the item. Accurate descriptions help build trust in the platform, they said.

Amazon uses a metric called item data quality to help measure the accuracy of product listings. But the metric has limitations—it checks that a listing had at least one keyword and a brand name in it, for instance, but it can’t assess the product description more broadly.

For example, it wouldn’t be able to judge if the product listing “super fast blender for fruits” accurately described the product, said a person who talked to Amazon about the changes.

Amazon is testing a new metric, composite data quality, said the same person. CDQ scores listings on attributes like description quality and title accuracy, Amazon has told sellers. It can go beyond yes-or-no answers and form a more nuanced assessment of the listing’s accuracy, the person said.

Amazon is also trying to tailor search results to more specific user queries in other ways. The company has recently been testing a new feature known as ImageSmith on some listings for its U.S. site, according to messages from Amazon representatives to sellers reviewed by The Information. ImageSmith selects the most relevant image from a product’s listing to appear in search results based on the specific query a customer uses, according to the messages.

Better Sales

Max Sinclair, a former Amazon employee, started the marketing firm Azoma three years ago to help brands perform better in AI search, particularly on Amazon. His clients include David Protein and tech firm HP.

An example of the old keyword-focused product listings for David’s protein bars included one like this: “David, Protein Bar, Blueberry Pie, Pack of 12 Protein Bars | 28g of Protein | 150 Calories | 0g of Sugar - High Protein, Low Carb, Gluten Free Protein Bar Flavor: Jammy blueberry pie filling with baked pie crust. Sweet with white chocolate chunks and vanilla cookie crisps. Each bite is filled with flavor and different textures.”

The listing designed to show up better in AI searches is much longer and written much more conversationally. It starts: “Fuel your fitness journey with David Protein Bars, engineered for health-conscious professionals who demand results without compromise. Each bar delivers an impressive 28g of high-quality protein packed into just 150 calories, making it one of the most protein-dense snacks available.”

Some shoppers might prefer the older listing, which presents more details in a more straightforward way. But Sinclair says the newer listing helped the snack brand surge to the 33rd position in the sports nutrition bar category from the number 400 rank over several months.

Still, it’s possible the merchants seeing the improvements could have gotten similar results from other tactics. Some of them had little experience with sophisticated ways to improve their search rankings.

These better rankings could have a downside for Amazon, if merchants decide sales improvements from product listings make buying ads on Amazon’s marketplace page less important. Amazon’s $56 billion ad business mostly comes from merchants advertising their products on the e-commerce site.

That’s already happening with merchants working with Katya Constantine, CEO of ad agency DigishopGirl Media. Constantine’s clients enjoyed 20% to 30% growth in traffic after their listings began to incorporate conversational English, which is one reason she’s spending slightly less on Amazon ads this year.

But other sellers still find ads useful. Khandrius said they ensure his products get seen in the first place, while improving the listings to be more AI-friendly makes it more likely shoppers will actually buy his offerings once they find them.

Meanwhile, shoppers’ growing use of Rufus has forced merchants to rethink their approach to search. Amazon marketing agency Lunge Marketing recently helped its clients, which include brands like Disney and New Balance, make up for a drop in the number of shoppers typing queries into Amazon’s search bar, according to Jonathan Wilner, Lunge’s vice president of brand and advertising.

Rufus doesn’t give advertisers as much data as typical keyword searches, Wilner said. But its queries help his clients better understand the types of shoppers that are browsing for certain products, which can help the clients fine-tune their pages and product descriptions. (Amazon says Rufus is just one of many spots on its site where shoppers can learn about their products, including Amazon Lens and the Amazon home page.)

WSJ : Johnson & Johnson in Talks to Buy Protagonist Therapeutics

Johnson & Johnson in Talks to Buy Protagonist Therapeutics
The two companies are already codeveloping a treatment for ulcerative colitis

Johnson & Johnson JNJ 0.24%increase; green up pointing triangle is in talks to buy Protagonist Therapeutics PTGX 9.40%increase; green up pointing triangle in a deal that would solidify the companies’ existing partnership, according to people familiar with the matter.

The details

A deal is not guaranteed and the exact details being discussed couldn’t be learned, the people said.

Protagonist had a market value of over $4 billion as of Thursday’s close. Including a typical premium, a deal would likely value the company well above that.

J&J is already working with Protagonist to develop an oral treatment for immune diseases including plaque psoriasis and ulcerative colitis and has the exclusive rights to commercialize the product. It already owns close to 4% of Protagonist’s shares, according to FactSet.

By acquiring Protagonist, the healthcare conglomerate would also gain access to the drug rusfertide, from Protagonist and partner Takeda Pharmaceutical 4502 -2.63%decrease; red down pointing triangle. Rusfertide has shown promise in late-stage testing in treating a rare blood cancer called polycythemia vera.

Both assets would complement J&J’s portfolio of immune and cancer drugs.

Protagonist’s stock is up over 70% so far this year through Thursday, fueled in part by the promising trial results of its treatments for plaque psoriasis—an autoimmune disease—and the bowel disease ulcerative colitis. Shares have gained more than 450% since the company’s initial public offering in 2016.

Still, the deal would be easily digestible for J&J, which is worth close to $460 billion.

The context

J&J’s immune-disease drug Stelara, one of the company’s biggest sellers in recent years, began facing heavy competition from lower-cost copycats this year, and the company warned to expect accelerating sales losses.

The company has a number of products it is counting on to offset the losses. But like all drugmakers regularly dealing with patent expirations, J&J has turned to a mix of in-house development and acquisitions to refill its offerings.

(Makor) TIT IM Share class review & Potential Conversion



From: LCHEKROUN@makor-cm.com At: 10/10/25 16:32:47 UTC+2:00
To: csilfverling@covaliscapital.com, scampbell@covaliscapital.com
Subject: FW: TIT IM Share class review & Potential Conversion

 

Conclusion

 

TITR IM is currently trading at a 12.7% premium to TIT IM.

As per feedback from various index desks, TITR has been short listed for entry into the MSCI at the next MSCI review (Cut-off date Nov 05th, effective end of Nov) which could be fulling TITR outperformance. The impact should be more than €400m passive inflow.

TITR’s dividend is privileged. However, any TITR’s €2.75c dividend is lost if not paid within 2 years but if TI decides to resume paying TITR’s dividend, TI will always have to make-up for the two previous years. Hence, when and if TI decides to resume paying TITR’s dividend in June 2026, TI will have to pay TITR’s shareholders €8.25c (confirmed by TI’s IR) costing the company €497m.

TI has to resume paying the TITR’s dividend if TI’s Net income is positive but this is not expected anytime soon. TIT’s guidance for Net / EBITDA 25E is <1.9x and approx. 1.7x accounting for the effect of the 98 Concession fee. It could also be added that leverage shoud be close to 1x by YE 27E (see section D for more details). The company seems to be delivering on its deleveraging plan but the potential €497m dividend catch up remains an overhang.

Even if the final decision from the Supreme Court on the ’98 fee should be a positive, the €1.0 bn amount has already been monetized by the company in July 2025. As per the company latest guidance, it is not expected the company to receive any of the NetCo deal earn-outs amounts (see section D for more details).

There was a debate back in 2022 on section 6.5 of the articles and TI’s ability to pay similar dividends to Ordinary and Savings if paid out of reserves. This is not an option anymore as the company does no longer have any reserves available for distribution to shareholders (as of YE 2024) (see section F for more details).

The obvious alternative from resuming payment of TITR’s dividends in the future would be for TI to convert TITR at a premium to TIT.

It is likely that the conversion offer structure to be a simple ratio (as done in most similar conversions in Italy in the past), conditional on TIT’s shareholders approving by a 2/3rd vote as well as TITR’s shareholders approving by a 20% vote.

Assuming the €8.25c accrued Savings dividend is paid in June 2026, the total Present Value of TITR’s divivend differential rigths is worth €0.209 per share (see section B & C for more details).

The key unknown is how much of that value will TI be willing to offer in order to proceed with the conversion.

The possible range would be 50-75% or:

  • An implied TITR’s premium vs TIT of 22-33%
  • An implied exchange ratio of 1.22-1.33
  • Hence a potential upside of 9-20%

If TI decides to opt for the conversion in a 1.22-1.33 range, Poste Italia stake would be diluted from the current 24.81% to 16.3-16.8%.

The risk/reward on such position seems attractive enough to get involved and recomment a Long TITR / Short TIT position. The key unknown has always been when the company will decide to move forward

Laurent Chekroun
 ​​​​
Equity Sales
Makor Securities London Ltd. | Makor Group
E: LCHEKROUN@makor-cm.com
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