New York, May 22, 2026, 14:04 (EDT)
- Hewlett Packard Enterprise shares rose nearly 10% in Friday trading, extending a sharp May run.
- Analysts pointed to AI infrastructure and networking demand, with HPE’s June 1 earnings call now the next major test.
- Risks remain around valuation, memory-chip costs and whether customers keep spending at the current pace.
Hewlett Packard Enterprise shares jumped on Friday, trading at $37.33, up 9.9%, at 2:01 p.m. EDT, as investors pushed deeper into hardware and networking stocks before a busy earnings stretch. The stock was trading while the U.S. market was open, ahead of the Memorial Day closure on Monday, May 25.
The move matters now because HPE is less than two weeks from its fiscal second-quarter earnings call on June 1. The company said the call will cover results for the quarter ended April 30, giving investors a fresh look at whether demand for AI servers and networking gear is flowing through to revenue and margins.
Evercore ISI said hardware and networking stocks were well placed into earnings season, citing durable spending on AI infrastructure and network upgrades. The firm said Dell Technologies and HPE were “well positioned to report upside and raise their full-year guidance,” while naming Dell as its top pick. Investing.com
The rally was broad. Dell rose about 16.6%, HP Inc. gained about 14.4% and HPE advanced about 10.6% in Friday trading, according to market data cited by Investing.com. That made the day less about HPE alone and more about a sudden bid for old-line hardware names tied to AI spending.
Bernstein SocGen raised its price target — an analyst’s estimate of where a stock may trade over the next year — on HPE to $35 from $21 this week, while keeping a Market Perform rating. The firm cited stronger demand for traditional servers from agentic AI workloads, meaning software systems that can act more independently and use more computing power, and said HPE could gain share if Super Micro Computer loses ground.
HPE also has a networking story to sell. On May 20, the company said Gartner placed HPE as a Leader in its 2026 Magic Quadrant for enterprise wired and wireless local-area network infrastructure, a ranking of vendors that provide office and campus networking systems. Sujai Hajela, HPE’s executive vice president for campus and branch networking, said the position reflected “strong customer momentum” behind HPE’s AI-native, self-driving networks. Hewlett Packard Enterprise
A day later, HPE said South Korean coworking company FASTFIVE selected HPE Aruba Networking EdgeConnect SSE to strengthen security and simplify IT operations across more than 60 office locations. FASTFIVE CIO Wookyung Kim said the system gave the company “visibility, consistency, and agility” as it scales. Hewlett Packard Enterprise
There is also balance-sheet help in the background. HPE completed the sale of a 13.8% stake in H3C Technologies for about $986.8 million and expects to sell another 5.2% stake for about $370.4 million in the first half of 2026, moves analysts have tied to debt reduction after the Juniper acquisition.
Activist pressure remains part of the setup. Elliott Investment Management reported holding 27.4 million HPE shares valued at about $652.9 million in its first-quarter 13F filing, a regulatory disclosure of large institutional holdings.
But the stock now has less room for disappointment. Morgan Stanley analyst Erik Woodring warned this week that IT hardware valuations had reached stretched levels and that investors may be missing “the forest through the trees,” with memory-chip inflation, supply shortages and macro volatility creating margin and earnings risk in the second half. Memory chips are a key server component, so higher prices can hurt profit if vendors cannot pass costs on. Investing.com
That is the bear case into June 1. HPE has to show that AI server orders, Juniper and Aruba networking demand, and H3C cash proceeds can offset cost pressure and any slowdown in customer spending. The share price has already moved. The next report has to catch up.
