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Welcome to Seeking Alpha's Wall Street

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Lunch, our afternoon update on today's

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market action, news and analysis. Good

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afternoon. Today is Thursday, May 2nd, and

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I'm your host, Kim Khan. Our top

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story so far. Peloton Interactive

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announced that Barry McCarthy is stepping

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down from his role as CEO,

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President and Board Director. McCarthy

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will become a strategic advisor to the company through the

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end of this year. The

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Peloton board has initiated a search to

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un-inify Peloton's next CEO. Meanwhile,

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Karen Boone, current Peloton Chairwoman,

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and Chris Brutso, a Peloton

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Director, will serve as interim

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co-CEOs. The company also announced

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that it will lay off 15% of

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its global workforce. The stock

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initially popped on the announcement of leadership

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change, but is now tumbling after it

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missed quarterly consensus estimates on the top

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and bottom lines. In

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today's training, stocks are higher,

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but the major averages are seeing resistance right

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around the peak of where they were Wednesday

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when Fed Chief Jay Powell was speaking. Rates

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are mixed, coming off the lows after

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another batch of Q1 data that lean

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to the stagflationary side. Q1

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non-farm productivity crept up 0.3% quarter on quarter, less

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than the 0.9% expected, and slowing

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markedly from the 3.5% pace in the previous quarter.

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Current labor costs climbed 4.7% quarter

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on quarter, much stronger than the 3.3%

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expected, and accelerating from

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0.4% in Q4 2023. The

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measure reflects a 5% increase in

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hourly compensation, along with the productivity

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gain. But Wells Fargo

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economists noted that when measured over the past

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year, non-farm productivity growth is up 2.9%, the

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strongest gain in three years. The

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downward trend in ULCs points to inflationary pressure from the

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jobs market

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continuing to subside and is supportive of

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inflation resuming its downward trend later this

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year," they added. Initial

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jobless claims stayed steady at $208,000 for

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the week, a touch lower than expected. Continuing

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claims fell to $1.774 million versus the

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$1.8 million consensus. Among

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active stocks, Novo Nordisk boosted its

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full-year outlook on the back of

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strong Q1 results, driven by increased

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demand for its GLP1-based diabetes and

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weight loss drugs of Zempic and

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Wigovi. Wigovi sales were

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the doubles and Ozempic sales grew

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43 percent in constant currency. But

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the stock edged down, as the company said,

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and is facing pricing pressure from competitors. Fastly

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plunged as Bank of America downgraded the

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content delivery network company to underperform from

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buy with a price target of $8.

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Analyst Madeline Brooks says decelerating

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growth in Fastly's largest customers,

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share loss and delivery at limited visibility in

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the second half, caused us to question a

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rebound in 2024. While

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we continue to like Fastly's positioning in

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the edge compute market, we see it

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as a 2025 opportunity instead

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of a near-term growth driver. And

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JP Morgan upgraded Carvana to overweight from

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neutral. Analyst Raja

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Gupta said Carvana's Q1 results showed

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continued rapid progress on all fronts.

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His view is that there is still ample room for

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the company to accelerate growth. In

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other needs of note, a former quality

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auditor of Spirit Era Systems, who

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alleged that the company leadership ignored

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defects on Boeing's 737 MAX,

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died Tuesday morning after struggling with

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an infection. A

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Seattle Times says Josh Dean lived

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in Wichita, Kansas, where Spirit is

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headquartered. He was 45 years old

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and had been in good health. A

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family member said Dean had died after two weeks

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in critical condition. He had

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provided testimony in a shareholder lawsuit against

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Spirit and also filed a complaint with

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the FAA that claimed serious and gross...

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misconduct by senior quality management of

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the 737 production line at the

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company. Spirit is a supplier

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of airplane parts to Boeing and Airbus. Dean

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was a client of a South Carolina

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law firm that also represented Boeing whistleblower

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John Mitch Barnett. In March,

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Barnett was found dead in an apparent suicide.

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And in the Wall Street Research Corner, Ned

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Davis Research's crowd sentiment poll ended

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its third longest streak of optimism

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since 1995. For

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the first time in 20 weeks, the poll ended its

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optimism zoom. NDR says the

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S&P 500 returns have been slightly weaker

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than average for the next three months

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following periods of optimism ending. In

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addition, analysts say that both optimism and

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pessimism streaks have become more common, with

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the six longer surrends of excessive optimism

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coming after 2016. Analyst

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Ed Klisold says, when it comes

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to pessimism streaks, the 200-day streak

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that ended in January of last

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year reflected pervasive recession fears. That

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was the second-longest rung after the 2008-2009 financial crisis. That's

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all for today's Wall Street Lunch. Look for links

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for stories in the show notes section. Don't

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forget, these episodes will be up. Transcriptions.

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stocks and ETFs, go to speakingalpha.com/subscriptions.