KLA Corporation (KLAC)'s Shares Upgraded By Barclays

We recently published 13 Best Semiconductor Equipment Stocks to Buy According to Hedge Funds. KLA Corporation (NASDAQ:KLAC) is one of the stocks Jim Cramer recently discussed.

KLA Corporation (NASDAQ:KLAC) is one of the largest semiconductor equipment companies in the sector. Its products cover several areas of chip production, such as deposition, etching, inspection, and design solutions for the PCB market. The shares have gained more than 89% year-to-date.

During this time period, KLA Corporation (NASDAQ:KLAC) has experienced favorable and unfavorable attention from analysts. For instance, Barclays upgraded the stock to Overweight from Equalweight in late October and bumped the share price target to $1,200 from $700. A key role in the bank’s optimism was its belief that KLA Corporation (NASDAQ:KLAC)  was relatively insulated from a drop in Chinese revenues due to lower semiconductor capital equipment spending.

The upgrade from Barclays came a month after Morgan Stanley had downgraded the shares to Equalweight from Overweight and increased the share price target to $1,093 from $928. KLA Corporation (NASDAQ:KLAC)’s fiscal first-quarter earnings report, released in late October, saw the firm’s $8.81 in EPS and $3.21 billion in revenue beat analyst estimates of $8.60 and $3.17 billion.

While we acknowledge the potential of KLAC as an investment, our conviction lies in the belief that some AI stocks hold greater promise for delivering higher returns and have limited downside risk. If you are looking for an extremely cheap AI stock that is also a major beneficiary of Trump tariffs and onshoring, see our free report on the best short-term AI stock.

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Disclosure: None. This article is originally published at Insider Monkey.