Nike’s Turnaround Loses Patience as Affirm Wins a Fresh Bull

A $26 cut to Nike’s price target captured the split in Monday’s analyst traffic: patience is wearing thin with a storied consumer turnaround, while investors are being invited back into a fintech name that recently stumbled.

Baird moved Nike to Neutral from Outperform and reduced its target to $44 from $70, according to The Fly. Analyst Jonathan Komp did not abandon the long-term recovery thesis. The problem is the road between here and there. Since Nike’s late-June earnings report, the firm has grown more concerned about execution, valuation and the possibility that consensus estimates remain too generous for the next leg of the recovery.

That caution lands as Nike works through an expensive reset under Chief Executive Elliott Hill. The company’s fiscal 2026 second-quarter results showed wholesale revenue rising 8%, but Nike Direct revenue falling 8%, with digital sales down 14%. Gross margin also contracted to 40.6%, pressured partly by higher North American tariffs. Nike has described fiscal 2026 as a year of action, but Wall Street is now asking when those actions begin to rebuild profit rather than simply rearrange the business.

Affirm received the opposite treatment. Wolfe Research upgraded the buy-now-pay-later provider to Outperform from Peer Perform and set a $90 target. The call followed a sharp post-earnings underperformance, which Wolfe’s Darrin Peller viewed as improving the stock’s risk-reward rather than invalidating the growth story. Affirm’s shares had already climbed roughly 75% from their March low, making the upgrade less about a beaten-down asset and more about renewed confidence in operating momentum.

The bullish case rests on scale. Affirm ended fiscal 2026 with more than $50 billion in trailing-twelve-month gross merchandise volume and about 28 million active consumers, according to its investor materials. Wolfe expects management’s expansion plans, including a projected fiscal 2027 GMV level near $64 billion and an adjusted operating margin around 30.5%, to support further earnings growth.

Elsewhere, Compass Point upgraded Coinbase to Neutral from Sell and lifted its target to $177 from $130, citing a more favorable bitcoin-cycle setup. It also raised Bullish to Buy, showing how quickly analysts are repricing crypto-linked equities when sentiment turns. The broader message was clear: Nike needs proof, while Affirm and selected crypto names are being rewarded for momentum that is already visible.