AST SpaceMobile (ASTS) fell 9% to $46.58 in morning trading after Piper Sandler downgraded the stock to Neutral from Overweight, citing less conviction in the pace of commercial satellite launches, as SpaceX's expanding direct-to-cell push could restrict launch access and pressure pricing. The stock is down 36% year to date and below its prior 52-week low of $47.57. Deutsche Bank took the opposite view in the previous session, upgrading to Buy from Hold and arguing the selloff exceeded the value of the company's spectrum position. Planet Labs (PL) and Rocket Lab (RKLB) also declined, down 4% and 2%. AST SpaceMobile has 13 BlueBird satellites in orbit, targets 45 by early 2027, and reports a contracted backlog of $1.3 billion.
Summary written by Upside AI from the original article. Read the source for full details.
Read the original on Yahoo Finance ↗
Related news
- AST SpaceMobile Falls 8% as Piper Sandler Cuts Target to $54 on SpaceX Competition; Rocket Lab Slips
Piper Sandler downgraded AST SpaceMobile to Neutral from Overweight and cut its price target to $54, citing lower confidence in the company's satellite launch pace over the next two years. The firm pointed to SpaceX's expanding direct-to-cell plans, warning SpaceX could limit launch availability for partners or pressure pricing through its own service. Clear Street reiterated a Buy rating and $115 target, arguing AST SpaceMobile remains roughly six months ahead of SpaceX in direct-to-cell. Three more BlueBird satellites arrived at Cape Canaveral ahead of a planned launch, but no firm date has been set. AST SpaceMobile shares fell 8% to $43.38, a steeper drop than Rocket Lab (down 2% to $62.77) and SpaceX (down 2% to $152.88).
- Rocket Lab Tumbles 11% as Neutron’s First Flight Moves to 2027; SpaceX and AST SpaceMobile Pull Back
Rocket Lab said the first launch of its Neutron rocket is now expected in 2027, after manufacturing found voids in the carbon composite layers of the propellant dome. CEO Peter Beck said the problem is solved and would reduce margin but not necessarily cause an in-flight failure, while cryogenic and hydrostatic testing will not finish until Q1 2027, later than the earlier target of delivering Neutron to the launch pad before the end of 2026. Rocket Lab shares fell 11% to $52.85 in morning trading, after an 8% drop the previous day to $59.18. SpaceX and AST SpaceMobile each fell about 2%, the UFO ETF slid 2% and the SPY fell 0.3%, which the article reads as a company-specific repricing. Backlog reached $2.36 billion at the end of Q2 2026, up 137% year over year.
- AST SpaceMobile’s stock is feeling the heat from SpaceX’s wireless plans
- AST SpaceMobile Stock Price Target Slashed in Half. The SpaceX Curse.
- AST SpaceMobile Is the New Battleground Stock
- Why AST SpaceMobile Stock Keeps Falling
AST SpaceMobile (ASTS) rose 1% on Monday before falling again on Tuesday, down about 9% intraday and nearly 26% over the past week. Deutsche Bank upgraded the stock to buy after it lost 65% of its market capitalization from May to October, arguing investors overreacted to launch delays; analyst Bryan Kraft says all but $10 of the share price is backed by the value of AST's cellphone spectrum. Kraft also expects SpaceX's satellite direct-to-cell network to push telecom companies toward partnering with AST. Piper Sandler downgraded the stock to neutral, noting that Ariane, Blue Origin and United Launch Alliance rockets are currently unavailable, which leaves AST dependent on SpaceX, now its primary competitor, to launch satellites. AST needs between 45 and 60 satellites to cover even select markets.
Related markets
Latest news
- JPMorgan Backs Two Defense Startups With $5 Billion
JPMorgan has already committed half of its $10 billion investment pool to hypersonic-missile maker Castelion and defense manufacturer Hadrian. The bet reflects America's push to rebuild its defense industrial base.
- X-Energy, Amazon, AEP Partner To Evaluate Feasibility Of 960 MW Nuclear Project In Indiana – A Look At The Key Highlights
X-energy and American Electric Power (AEP) announced a joint development agreement to evaluate the feasibility of a proposed 960-megawatt small modular reactor project in Indiana, with Amazon supporting development through a milestone-based funding agreement. The plant would feature 12 Xe-100 units near the former Breed Generating Station in Sullivan County, redeveloping an AEP-owned brownfield site. It is the second commercial project under the X-energy and Amazon collaboration, which aims to bring more than 5 gigawatts of new nuclear capacity to the U.S. grid by 2039. At the time of writing, XE was up 2%, AMZN gained 3.75%, and AEP fell 1.13%.
- Waymo Will Be “a Trillion Dollar Business. Easy” per VC Investor
Bessemer Venture Partners' Sameer Dholakia says Waymo could become a trillion-dollar business by expanding from ride-hailing into personal car ownership, trucking and logistics. The article notes Bessemer invested in Waymo's $16 billion February round, which valued the company at $126 billion. Waymo reached 500,000 paid rides a week in March, but Sacra estimates its annualized revenue at only $355 million in February, under 0.1% of Alphabet's $403 billion in 2025 revenue. Alphabet trades at 25.0x forward earnings, within its usual range, while Uber trades at 18.2x, a level analyst Walter Piecyk links to the threat from Waymo and Tesla's Robotaxi.
- Jensen Huang Declares NVIDIA Can Win “in the Absence of Any AI Labs”
NVIDIA CEO Jensen Huang said on the BG2 podcast that about a third of the business, classical computing unrelated to AI labs, is growing 30% to 40% a year, while frontier labs account for roughly 25% to 30% of compute. In the three months to July 26, 2026, revenue rose 106% to $96.2 billion, with AI clouds, industrial and enterprise revenue up 138%. Steve Eisman cited a 10-Q line showing 70% of NVIDIA's accounts receivable comes from five customers, though the article notes receivables are not the same as revenue share. NVIDIA trades at 17.7x forward earnings, near its three-year low of 17.5x and well below its 30.3x average.
- AWS Margin Expansion and Retail Execution Power Amazon (AMZN) in Q3
Wedgewood Partners reported that its Wedgewood Composite returned 2.5% net in the third quarter of 2026, compared with 2.3% for the S&P 500 and 0.9% for the Russell 1000 Growth. In its investor letter, the firm named Amazon a leading contributor, citing AWS revenue growth accelerating to 37% from 17% a year earlier and a 63% rise in the segment's operating income. AWS backlog of around $500 billion is more than double last year's level and up 37% from 90 days earlier, and Wedgewood said this demand supports a plan to double AWS capacity from circa 2025 levels by 2027. Advertising grew 26% and generated over $75 billion in revenue over the past 12 months. As of October 16, 2026, Amazon closed at $250.00, with a market capitalization of $2.7 trillion and a 21.22% gain over the past year.
- Bitcoin is rejected at $83K as US bond yields reverse higher with equities
Bitcoin failed to follow rising equities as a wall of sell orders above $83,000 across exchanges capped gains, and BTC slipped below $82,000 after Monday's Wall Street open. The Nasdaq Composite gained 1.5% and South Korea's KOSPI rose 1.76% to 5,768 points, while the US 10-year yield climbed to 5.13% and the 30-year to 5.46%, moving in step with stocks ahead of major tech earnings from Meta, SpaceX and Tesla. QCP Capital warned that a repeat of last week's tech sell-off could threaten the $80,000 support level. Crypto liquidations totaled $335 million over 24 hours, and the Binance whale ratio fell to 0.45 from 0.54 at the start of October.
Get the briefing on Telegram or Zalo
Join the Upside Telegram channel or Zalo group for the Vietnam stocks and gold briefing at 8:00 and 19:00 (Vietnam time) on trading days, plus a weekly wrap on Saturday morning.