New York, January 7, 2026, 11:36 EST — Regular session
- AppLovin shares rose about 2% in mid-morning trading, outperforming a flat broader market.
- Piper Sandler reiterated an Overweight rating and $800 target; Benchmark kept a Buy with a $775 target.
- Traders are watching for updates on holiday e-commerce ad performance ahead of an expected mid-February results report.
AppLovin (APP.O) shares rose about 2% on Wednesday, building on a choppy start to the year as fresh analyst notes kept attention on the company’s push into e-commerce advertising. The stock was up at $629.57, while the S&P 500 was little changed and the Nasdaq-100 ETF edged higher; rival Trade Desk fell.
The move matters because AppLovin’s next leg is still being priced in. Bulls are betting the company can broaden beyond mobile-game ads into web and e-commerce budgets, and the next earnings call is expected to put real numbers around that shift.
Piper Sandler reiterated its Overweight rating — meaning it expects the stock to outperform — and kept an $800 price target, pointing to signs of continued adoption through the fourth quarter and stronger checks around Black Friday/Cyber Monday. The firm also flagged ad-library work that it said showed paid marketing tests across more than 180 brands, including Apple and Amazon.
Benchmark, which named AppLovin a “2026” top idea, reiterated a Buy rating and a $775 target, arguing the story rests on two engines: the core gaming ad business and a growing web and e-commerce offering. It highlighted uptake in the self-serve Axon Ads Manager and improving “return on ad spend” — a measure of revenue generated per dollar of advertising — particularly in prospecting campaigns aimed at finding new customers. Investing.com
Bank of America Securities analyst Omar Dessouky also kept a Buy rating and an $860 target, citing growth in AppLovin’s Axon footprint inside online retail. He pointed to the company’s tracking pixel — a snippet of code used to measure ad performance — being installed across nearly 4,000 online merchants, and said fourth-quarter guidance could prove conservative if holiday spending trends hold up.
The core question for traders is whether those early signals show up in reported e-commerce revenue and retention, not just in anecdotal “checks.” Self-serve tools matter here because they can widen the advertiser base without leaning on large agency relationships, and investors are sensitive to any hint that the ramp is slowing.
But AppLovin’s e-commerce pitch sits on data, measurement and a steady flow of ad dollars — areas that can draw scrutiny and swing with the economy. The company has also faced questions about data-collection practices; the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission has been probing the issue, Bloomberg reported in October, citing people familiar with the matter.
Next up, investors are circling the next earnings report, which TipRanks lists for Feb. 18 after the close, along with a consensus EPS forecast of $2.95 for the quarter. Management’s read on holiday e-commerce ad performance — and what that means for early 2026 spend — is likely to set the tone.
