Anthem of the Seas cruise ship

Royal Caribbean drops as weak Q3 outlook overshadows strong Q2 results

The cruise-line operator continues to benefit from strong bookings even as competition heats up.

7/29/25 8:09AM

Shares of Royal Caribbean fell 6% in premarket trading Tuesday after the cruise giant’s strong Q2 results and improved full-year guidance weren’t enough to wow investors following the stock’s 53% gain so far this year, because its near-term outlook isn’t nearly as impressive.

Adjusted earnings per share came in at $4.38, well above the $4.09 expected by analysts polled by FactSet and blowing away the high end of the company’s guidance for $4.00 to $4.10. Revenue came in at $4.53 billion, falling just an inch shy of Wall Street’s estimates of $4.55 billion.

Royal Caribbean also raised its full-year 2025 adjusted EPS guidance to a range of $15.41 to $15.55, lifting the low end from its prior forecast of $14.55, thanks to these strong Q2 results. The midpoint of this range is above the $15.45 figure penciled in by analysts.

But there’s a catch: while upgrading its outlook thanks to strong operational performance in the first half of the year, management also signaled that the start of the second half wouldn’t deliver the same kind of knockout results. For the third quarter, management said adjusted EPS would range between $5.55 to $5.65, while the consensus is looking for $5.84. Royal Caribbean said the fact that cost growth was under control so much in Q2, flattering those results, was “driven entirely by shifting of timing of operating expenses into the second half of the year.”

Royal Caribbean and rivals like Carnival have seen blowout quarters this year, fueled by huge booking demand, even as ticket prices climb. An estimated 19 million Americans are expected to take a cruise this year, marking the third straight year of record passenger volume.

It hasn’t been all smooth sailing. Back in April, Royal Caribbean was hit with a pair of price target cuts as some analysts flagged market uncertainty and questioned how long the demand boom could last.

Matt Phillips2h

Intel soars amid retail engagement, analyst chatter

Intel ripped toward a new 52-week high Wednesday, amid a flurry of activity in the options market and a couple of positive analyst assessments ahead of its earnings report due tomorrow.

Shortly after 11 a.m. ET, call options activity was roughly equivalent to the full-day average over the past 10 sessions. Bets on stock swings using call options have become a highly popular retail trade, suggesting that retail investors are getting interested in the shares ahead of the report from the partially nationalized American chip icon.

(That interpretation is buttressed by what we’re seeing on social sentiment-monitoring sites like SwaggyStocks, which at about 11:30 a.m. listed Intel as the fifth-most-mentioned stock on Reddit’s r/WallStreetBets forum over the past 24 hours.)

Wall Street analysts are also chattering about the stock, with RBC and Bernstein Research both writing about it in the last 24 hours.

RBC — which has a “sector perform” (or neutral) rating on Intel — said it expects a “slight beat and largely inline outlook” when the company reports after the close Thursday.

Bernstein’s Intel watchers — who have a “market perform” (also neutral) rating on the stock — seemed a bit more cautious, writing, “Overall numbers going forward still looking high to us. Fundamentals and valuation keep us sidelined.”

“If there is no memory, there’s no AI.”

FLASH FORWARD

ByMattPhillips

WedJan 212026

Matt Phillips4h

BNP upgrades Seagate on more durable cycle

Seagate Technology Holdings was up in early trading after analysts at BNP Paribas upgraded the shares to “outperform” from “neutral” and lifted their price target to $380 a share, implying a gain of almost 15% from where the stock is currently trading.

The maker of the somewhat stodgy technology known as hard disk drives — or HDDs in tech lingo — was one of the top stocks in the S&P 500 for much of last year as it was swept up in the AI data center trade.

Data centers need tons of storage capacity, and demand from hyperscalers has driven up prices and created shortages for disk drives, an industry that is dominated by a duopoly of Seagate and Western Digital. (BNP also maintained its “outperform” rating on WDC in a note Wednesday.)

The analysts at BNP say they pushed by the buy button on the stock after becoming more convinced that the upswing in sales was durable, writing:

“We have witnessed a structural shift happening in HDD industry, toward 1) an effective duopoly, 2) higher mix toward data centers, and 3) disciplined capex investments. These have supported our expectations of long-term, through-cycle profitability for the HDD industry. We are now upgrading Seagate from Neutral to Outperform as we are gaining greater conviction that robust data center storage demand could drive an upcycle longer than we initially expected. We think a secular re-rating of Seagate (as well as Western Digital) to over 20x is justified.”

Nate Becker4h

Stocks jump as Trump says “I won’t use force” to acquire Greenland

In a speech in Davos, Switzerland, US President Donald Trump said he won’t use force to acquire Greenland, sending stocks higher at the open.

“We probably won't get anything unless I decide to use excessive strength and force, where we would be frankly unstoppable, but I won’t do that,” Trump told the crowd, referring to his pursuit of Greenland, which has roiled markets recently. “People thought I would use force. I don’t have to use force. I don’t want to use force. I won’t use force.”

He seemed to indicate that Denmark, which owns Greenland, could rebuff the US’s overtures to acquire the country without military retaliation.

“They have a choice. You can say yes and we will be very appreciative. Or you can say no and we will remember,” he said. Throughout his speech, Trump constantly reiterated his desire for the US to own Greenland.

Stocks rose at the open, with the S&P 500 rising 0.3%. S&P 500 futures, which had been down Wednesday morning, jumped after his comments.

J. Edward Moreno5h

J&J slips despite cheery 2026 guidance

Johnson & Johnson reported fourth-quarter sales that beat expectations and gave rosy guidance for 2026.

The company said it expects to bring in between $100 billion and $101 billion in revenue this year, compared to the $98.9 billion analysts polled by FactSet were expecting. The drugmaker also expects to report between $11.43 and $11.63 in annual adjusted earnings per share, compared to the $11.48 that Wall Street was expecting.

Despite beating expectations, J&J, the first major drugmaker to report earnings results this year, fell by more than 2% in premarket trading.