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Duolingo rises after CEO defends “AI-first” strategy in NY Times interview

Despite customer backlash to AI focus, analysts see Duolingo on track for steady growth as it rolls out new features and expands into music.

Nia Warfield

Shares of Duolingo jumped over 7% Monday morning after the company’s CEO defended its use of AI amid customer backlash.

In an interview with The New York Times published Sunday, founder and CEO Luis von Ahn said the language-learning company was still hiring employees at the same rate as before he directed the app’s workers to focus on AI.

Von Ahn said that using AI and automation in the language-learning process would in fact reduce the barriers to learning a new language, because “95 percent of people don’t want to talk to another person in a language that they are not very comfortable with. The emotional energy is just too high. The nice thing is, you don’t feel judged by a computer.”

Wall Street also gave the company’s shares a boost, as KeyBanc analysts upgraded the stock to “overweight” (buy) from “sector weight” and hiked their price target to $600 from $390 — a massive 70% jump from current trading levels.

While the company has faced backlash in recent months for becoming an “AI-first” platform, a move that displaced some human language teachers, analysts dismissed the controversy as “a bump in the road,” pointing instead to Duolingo’s strong margins, the rollout of its Energy feature, and the upcoming September Duocon update as drivers of future growth.

Separately, Citi also initiated coverage on the stock with a “buy” rating and a $400 price target, calling Duolingo firmly rooted in the online learning space.

Earlier this month, Duolingo shares climbed on Q2 results that topped estimates and came with a raised full-year sales forecast. The company also announced it had acquired the team behind NextBeat, a London-based music gaming startup, to fuel expansion into music education.

Duolingo shares are now up 9% year to date.

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POET Technologies nears multiyear high on strong call demand after flagship product wins award

POET Technologies is surging on heavy volumes and high call demand after announcing that it won a Product Innovation Award at China’s Infostone awards.

The honor went to the optical communications company’s flagship product, the Teralight, which uses light to move data between chips.

“Unveiled less than a year ago at the 2025 OFC Conference, POET Teralight has driven commercial interest in the Company because of its highly integrated design and complete optical system-on-chip architecture that simplifies module development,” per the press release.

This award may be the latest excuse to buy the stock, which is up over 40% year to date.

Call activity is elevated, with nearly 37,000 having changed hands as of 10:55 a.m. ET, well above the 20-day average of 28,030 for a full session. Shares are approaching their multi-year high of $9.41.

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Intel bucks market slump after Wall Street upgrades

While the market slid early Tuesday, Intel soared as the American chipmaker received a pair of upgrades:

  • HSBC analysts lifted their rating on the stock to “hold” — essentially “neutral” — from “reduce,” Wall Street-speak for “sell.” The analysts nearly doubled their price target for the shares to $50 from $26. (That’s essentially where the stock is currently trading.)

  • Seaport Global also boosted its rating to “buy” from “neutral,” with a $65 price target.

Improving demand for CPUs — Intel’s bread-and-butter processors — is behind HSBC’s newfound enthusiasm for the shares. Analysts at the bank wrote:

“We had been cautious on Intel mainly given overall uncertainty on customer pipeline and execution headwinds in their foundry business while the core business was also lacking visibility on growth drivers. However, we now turn more positive as we expect the traditional servers (DCAI) to get back on a growth trajectory. We expect there is an overwhelmingly increasing demand for server CPUs driven by rising agentic AI... While the stock has moved up 19% YTD (vs S&P 500 up 1%), we believe there is further [data center and AI group] upside still not fully priced in. Hence, we upgrade Intel from Reduce to Hold.”

HSBC seems to be slightly understating the extent of the gains for the stock so far in 2026, as its share price has risen nearly 30% since the end of last year. But the gains are even more impressive if you date them to the partial nationalization of the ailing American chip giant, which was announced on August 22. Almost a month later, Nvidia announced a strategic partnership with the company, giving it a massive shot in the arm. Since then the stock is up more than 90%.

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ImmunityBio surge continues on sign its drug may be approved to treat a broader range of bladder cancers

Once you start squeezing, you can’t put the toothpaste back in the tube.

Shares of ImmnuityBio are flying higher once again, up more than 30% in early trading Tuesday after having been down as much as 10% in the premarket. A little more than half an hour into the regular trading day, more than 46 million shares have changed hands, more than 3x the 20-day average for this point in the session.

Last week, we discussed how a number of positive press releases from the company touting the progress of its treatments helped send shares skyward, making the heavily shorted company a hot topic of discussion on the r/ShortSqueeze subreddit.

The positive press parade continues this morning, with ImmunityBio announcing that the FDA asked for more information about the ability of its ANKTIVA drug to treat a certain type of bladder cancer, though it doesn’t need to do any new clinical trials. Management said they would provide this information within 30 days.

Share are up nearly 200% over the past six sessions.

On Monday, the company published a podcast appearance by Dr. Patrick Soon-Shiong, founder, executive chairman, and global chief medical and technology officer, on “The Sean Spicer Show,” which was provocatively titled, “Is the FDA BLOCKING Life Saving Cancer Treatments?”

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