AppLovin Retail Sentiment Mixed Despite Wall Street Analysts Hailing ‘AdTech’s Best Executor’

Retail sentiment toward AppLovin Corp. (APP) failed to improve despite the app marketing platform receiving positive commentary from a couple of analysts on Thursday.

The message volume on the Stocktwits stream for the stock fell about 37% by late Thursday relative to the level seen a day ago. The follower count also remained stable.

Retail sentiment toward the AppLovin stock stayed ‘neutral’ (50/100) and the message volume was ‘normal.’

A bullish watcher said the stock could likely run toward $300 by Friday, even as futures point to a day in the red for U.S. markets.

However, a bearish watcher said trading volume was drying up as “bagholders,” a term used to refer to investors who hold onto a declining asset, were running out of money to buy more.

Even as retail mood remains mixed, Wall Street analysts continue to be bullish on the company.

On Thursday, Morgan Stanley analyst Matthew Cost upgraded AppLovin to ‘Overweight’ from ‘Equal-weight’ but cut the price target to $350 from $470, citing macroeconomic uncertainties.  

The new price target suggests the stock is still trading at a 33% discount to its last close following the sell-off triggered by President Donald Trump’s tariffs.

Morgan Stanley’s optimism is due to AppLovin’s consistent in-app advertising market outperformance since 2023 as “superior technology drives superior returns for advertisers.”

Calling AppLovin “ad tech’s best executor,” the analyst said gaming ad expectations appear achievable even as the company pushes into the non-gaming advertising market, starting with e-commerce. 

Morgan Stanley’s new analysis showed that AppLovin can meaningfully improve its take rate even while continuing to deliver competitive results for advertisers at scale.

Separately, The Fly reported that Piper Sandler analyst James Callahan maintained an ‘Overweight’ rating on the AppLovin stock, citing evidence of supply-side share gains for the company.

While stating that it would be a buyer of the stock, Piper Sandler reduced the price target to $425 from $575 due to lower peer multiples.

AppLovin stock climbed to an all-time intraday high of $525.15 on Feb. 13 before retreating as multiple short reports questioned the company’s fundamentals. 

The tariff sell-off seen since last week has aggravated the weakness further.

The stock settled Thursday’s session down 4.05% at $263.83, taking its year-to-date losses to nearly 19%.

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