Akamai Shares Rise 1.4% After Raymond James Upgrades Rating

Akamai Technologies shares rose 1.4% in premarket trading Oct. 20 after Raymond James upgraded the stock to Strong Buy, citing a recent decline in its share price.

Raymond James analyst Frank Louthan kept the $170 price target as the firm raised its rating from Outperform. The upgrade followed a recent pullback in Akamai shares.

The rating change comes as Akamai pursues its seven-year agreement with Anthropic. Anthropic committed to pay approximately $11.6 billion for dedicated cloud computing capacity and support, subject to delivery, service availability and termination provisions.

Akamai estimates about $5.5 billion in related capital spending, including approximately $1.7 billion in 2026. The company expects the agreement to leave its 2026 revenue guidance unchanged.

Akamai expects service to begin in late second quarter 2027. It projects the contract will reach a full annual revenue rate of about $1.7 billion by the end of 2028.