Wall Street analysts bullish on Circle after blockbuster IPO, but warn on sky-high valuation
(Reuters) -Wall Street brokerages began coverage of stablecoin issuer Circle Internet Group on Monday with broadly bullish ratings, though some analysts voiced concerns about its elevated valuation after the stock more than doubled since its market debut.
The New York-based company's shares were down nearly 3% in premarket trading.
Circle debuted this month at $69 per share in the first major IPO by a stablecoin issuer. The blockbuster flotation represents the biggest crypto listing since Coinbase's 2021 debut. The company had priced its IPO at $31 per share.
J.P. Morgan, Citigroup and Goldman Sachs were the lead underwriters for the offering.
After the industry-mandated quiet period expired, Barclays, Bernstein, Canaccord Genuity and Needham launched coverage with the equivalent of 'buy' ratings and price targets above $200.
"CRCL is building a market-leading digital dollar stablecoin network, with a strong regulatory edge, liquidity headstart and marquee distribution partnerships. This is hard to replicate, in our view," Bernstein analysts said in a note.
Circle is a blockchain infrastructure company best known for issuing USD Coin (USDC), a fully reserved, U.S. dollar-backed stablecoin used across crypto trading, payments, and decentralized finance.
In June, the U.S. Senate passed the GENIUS Act with bipartisan support, marking a watershed moment for the digital asset industry by establishing the first federal regulatory framework for stablecoins.
"CRCL is one of the only ways for public investors to play the blockchain infrastructure theme, and we believe stablecoins are nearing a pivotal turning point," Barclays said.
However, J.P. Morgan and Goldman Sachs pointed to the stock's elevated valuation, given its rapid rise since the IPO.
J.P. Morgan started coverage with the most bearish view on Wall Street - an 'underweight' rating with a price target of $80, implying a downside of 56% from the stock's last close of $180.43.
"We view CRCL's business and growth attractively, but valuation appears elevated," said Goldman, as the brokerage started coverage with 'neutral' and $83 price target.
Shares of Circle have surged 161% since their market debut.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Yahoo
40 minutes ago
- Yahoo
Visa and Mastercard's $253B Nightmare: The Crypto Threat That's Skipping the Swipe
A major turf war is heating up in the payments worldand Visa (NYSE:V) and Mastercard (NYSE:MA) suddenly find themselves on defense. Stablecoins like USDC are gaining traction, with companies like Shopify, Coinbase, and Stripe quietly rerouting payments around traditional card networks. For merchants, the pitch is irresistible: faster settlement, fewer fees, and no middlemen. With U.S. businesses spending roughly $187 billion a year on card swipe fees, even a small shift could redraw the map. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent has hinted the stablecoin marketnow at $253 billioncould reach $2 trillion in the next few years. That's not a side bet. That's a direct hit. Warning! GuruFocus has detected 9 Warning Signs with MSTR. Visa and Mastercard aren't sitting still. They're flipping the narrativecasting themselves as the connective tissue for all things digital, stablecoins included. Visa is letting banks issue digital tokens and pilot stablecoin settlement directly on its network. Mastercard, meanwhile, just teamed up with Paxos to mint and redeem USDG, its fiat-backed stablecoin. The goal? Keep one foot in every transactionwhether it's dollars, crypto, or something in between. The two networks are leaning into their edge: global scale, trusted rails, built-in fraud protection, and tokenization tech that masks sensitive data at checkout. That's not just defense. It's a strategic pivot. But displacing entrenched behavior won't be quickor clean. Consumers are hooked on card perks and protections. Stablecoin payments don't come with credit access or FDIC guarantees. And for merchants, new tech brings new headachesregulatory, operational, and tax-related. Still, the wheels are in motion. Shopify now offers 1% cashback in USDC to customers who pay with it. Coinbase is building out its own stablecoin payment layer. This isn't a passing crypto fad. It's a structural shift in how money movesand Visa and Mastercard are racing to stay on the rails. This article first appeared on GuruFocus. Sign in to access your portfolio
Bloomberg
an hour ago
- Bloomberg
Senators Came to Their Senses on AI Regulation Ban
Some sense has prevailed in the Senate — a 99-1 vote against a provision in its huge tax and spending bill that would have banned state-level artificial-intelligence laws for the next 10 years. It's been just 944 dizzying days since ChatGPT was launched into the world — imagine what might have happened over the next 3,653. A last-gasp effort to amend the bill, which included reducing 10 years to five, also failed. The new wording would have been more onerous than the original, decimating existing state laws on facial recognition and data privacy. New laws will need to tackle AI-triggered issues on discrimination, recruitment and mental health. The matter is simply too urgent to be left only in Washington's hands. Senators rightly saw through the moratorium as doing the bidding of big tech companies that want free rein to do as they please in the insatiable race to build and sell AI.
Geek Vibes Nation
an hour ago
- Geek Vibes Nation
How To Eliminate Guesswork In Business Decisions Using DI
When it comes to business, everything is about making the right decision at the right time. However, many leaders rely on intuition or outdated reports to make major decisions. It may result in a lack of opportunity, a delay in action, or even an expensive error. The great thing about this? You no longer need to do guesswork. Aided by advanced Decision Intelligence solutions, which combine artificial intelligence (AI) and decision-making, companies now have the opportunity to make smarter, faster, and more accurate decisions based on real-time data. Let's explore how DI works, why it matters, and how it helps eliminate the guesswork from decision-making. What Is Decision Intelligence? Decision Intelligence is an efficient technology that unites data, AI, and business logic to assist companies in making better decisions. Dashboards and reports are not enough. DI examines information across all parts of your business, interprets it, and suggests the next step to take. That is, traditional tools only inform you of what occurred; however, the DI will enable you to determine what to do now and even why you are doing what you are doing. Why Guesswork Still Happens in Business Businesses are continuously finding it hard to make optimal decisions, even when there a large amounts of data. Here's why: Too much data in too many places: Sales data on one system, supply data on another, and it is difficult to tie them together. Slow reporting: Reports are submitted on a weekly or monthly basis, which is too late to react to fast decisions. Limited human capacity: People can't analyze hundreds of variables at once. Lack of trust in AI: Not all leaders are willing to make use of what is suggested by a machine. Decision Intelligence solves all of this by gathering data from everywhere, analyzing it instantly, and recommending clear actions, backed by facts. Five Ways Decision Intelligence Eliminates Guesswork End-to-End Visibility DI stitches together siloed metrics—finance, marketing, supply chain—so leaders aren't making choices in isolation. Adaptive Forecasting AI recalibrates predictions with every new data point, ensuring decisions reflect real-time market sentiment rather than last quarter's snapshot. Scenario Stress Testing Before committing resources, teams can sandbox campaigns, price changes, or expansion plans across thousands of simulated economies. Bias Mitigation Quantitative models check human heuristics at the door, lowering the risk of anchoring, groupthink, or recency bias. Faster Cycle Time Automated insights collapse weeks of manual analysis into minutes, keeping momentum high and opportunity costs low. Implementing a Decision Intelligence Solution: A Pragmatic Roadmap 🟢Clarify the Decision Landscape Write out the activities that your team is making all the time, and yet, they have difficulty making well-informed, large-impact decisions. This could be inventory sizes, budgetary decisions, or talent distribution. Put first those that have KPIs. 🟢 Audit Your Data Foundation DI feeds on quality inputs. Institute data governance to check data policies, API connectivity compatibility, and clean old records to give a pass to garbage-in, garbage-out dilemmas. 🟢 Select or Build the Right Models Regardless of whether you will use out-of-the-box elements or personal pipelines, harmonize algorithms to business boundaries. An example is a supply-chain forecast that should include lead times and its storage capacity. 🟢 Embed Human Oversight Domain expertise is helpful even in the case of the most talented artificial intelligence and decision-making engine. Build feedback mechanisms to report edge cases by the managers, making the models more accurate in the long run. 🟢 Measure and Refine Post deployment, speed to decision, error reduction, and ROI lift. Use a monthly iteration, not a one-time install; DI is a breathing system, not a finished system. Decision Intelligence in Action Imagine a retail chain facing unpredictable demand swings. Instead of managers guessing how much stock to ship, the company's DI dashboard recommends precise replenishment quantities for each store by blending point-of-sale data, local events, and weather forecasts. When an unexpected heatwave hits, the system automatically boosts inventory for beverages and cooling appliances, preventing stockouts and lost sales. What once required frantic calls and spreadsheets now happens seamlessly, letting staff focus on superior customer experiences. Common Myths About DI 'Our data is too messy.' Most companies start this way. DI tools include features to clean and organize data over time. Most companies start this way. DI tools include features to clean and organize data over time. 'This will take away jobs.' Actually, DI frees up your team from manual reporting, so they can focus on strategy and creativity. Actually, DI frees up your team from manual reporting, so they can focus on strategy and creativity. 'AI can't be trusted.' The best DI platforms show exactly why a recommendation is made. It's all transparent and easy to understand. The Future of Smarter Decisions According to industry experts, most large companies will be using Decision Intelligence in the next few years. Those who adopt it early will have a major advantage—moving faster, reducing waste, and staying ahead of the competition. Final Thoughts With so much data available today, businesses need more than instinct. They need tools that help turn data into smart decisions—quickly and confidently. That's where Decision Intelligence solutions shine. By combining artificial intelligence with real-time insights, you can finally stop guessing and start making decisions that lead to real business success. Ready to take the guesswork out of your decisions? Start exploring how Decision Intelligence can transform your business today.
