Payment infrastructure providers and retail brokerages faced a week of analyst guidance resets, regulatory scrutiny, and market volatility during the week of October 12.
PayPal Holdings Inc. (NASDAQ: PYPL) extended a multi-day rally, closing its second consecutive week higher after announcing a partnership with AI shopping agent provider Glance to embed instant AI-driven checkout capabilities.
Mastercard Incorporated (NYSE: MA) announced a strategic partnership with WEX on October 12 to launch the Asia-Pacific region’s first unified fleet payments network, integrating fuel, maintenance, and tolling transactions into a single infrastructure.
Fiserv Inc. (NYSE: FISV) saw Cantor Fitzgerald, Barclays, and TD Cowen all lower their price targets amid an ongoing shareholder lawsuit urging a federal court to deny Fiserv’s motion following revenue guidance resets.
Despite those price target cuts, FISV stock ended the week approximately 4% higher, suggesting investors retained confidence in the company’s underlying business trajectory.
SoFi Technologies Inc. (NASDAQ: SOFI) shares dropped to a 52-week low of $13.86 amid investor concerns that revenue expansion was outpacing bottom-line profitability gains.
The neobank posted Q2 net revenue of $1.22 billion and raised its full-year top-line guidance to a range of $4.75 billion to $4.85 billion, but full-year adjusted EPS projections held flat near $0.60 as marketing spend and acquisition expenses squeezed margins.
Keefe Bruyette lowered its price target for SoFi to $15 from $16 and maintained an Underperform rating, citing rising interest rates and SoFi’s growing balance sheet as creating more than $1 billion in pressure this quarter.
Robinhood Markets faced its own analyst headwinds as Wells Fargo lowered its price target on the stock to $120 from $125, maintaining an Equal Weight rating, while shares fell over 9% to record a fourth consecutive weekly decline.
Robinhood founder and CEO Vlad Tenev sold nearly $43 million in company stock this month, a sale that coincided with a broader Bitcoin surge in early October that pushed the digital asset above $86,000 before macroeconomic headwinds from surging crude prices and rising Treasury yields created friction.
Affirm Holdings (NASDAQ: AFRM) and SoFi both continued navigating interest rate headwinds throughout the week, with elevated borrowing costs dampening consumer appetite even as deposit-heavy platforms benefited from wider net interest margins.
On October 14, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau announced a targeted enforcement initiative investigating major financial institutions for potential unlawful debanking, evaluating whether arbitrary account closures violate the Equal Credit Opportunity Act or rules prohibiting unfair, deceptive, or abusive acts and practices.
