Carillon Tower Advisers, an investment management company, released its “Carillon Eagle Mid Cap Growth Fund” third-quarter 2025 investor letter. A copy of the letter can be downloaded here. In the third quarter, the equity markets continued their rally, fueled by enthusiasm for AI, limited evidence of inflationary effects from tariffs, and expectations for further interest rate cuts from the U.S. Federal Reserve. Mid-cap stocks also maintained their positive gains during the quarter. The Russell Midcap Grow ...

Core Insights - Nvidia's stock declined for the second consecutive day despite exceeding earnings estimates, raising concerns about an AI bubble affecting high-flying tech stocks [1][8] - Ross Stores experienced a significant stock surge after surpassing third-quarter sales and profit estimates, indicating strong performance in the back-to-school season and an optimistic outlook for the holiday quarter [2][7] - Oracle's shares fell sharply due to concerns over its elevated valuation and heavy borrowing related to data center investments, marking a 28% decline over the past month [5][7] Company Performance - Nvidia reported third-quarter earnings that surpassed Wall Street expectations, yet its stock fell by 1% as fears of an AI bubble persisted [8] - Ross Stores' shares surged by 8.4% after the company reported strong quarterly results and raised its outlook for the holiday season, reflecting consumer demand for discount retail [2][7] - Insulet's shares rose by 5.8% following an investor day event where the company provided a three-year sales and profit forecast that exceeded expectations [4] Market Reactions - Major U.S. equity indexes rebounded, with the S&P 500 rising by 0.9%, the Dow increasing by 1.1%, and the Nasdaq up by 0.8% [2] - Comments from the Federal Reserve Bank of New York president boosted expectations for potential interest rate cuts, positively impacting stocks in the housing market, including Builders FirstSource, which saw a 7.1% increase [3] - Oracle's stock faced the heaviest decline among S&P 500 stocks, dropping 5.7% amid ongoing valuation concerns [5]

Core Insights - MongoDB has appointed Chirantan "CJ" Desai as the new CEO, succeeding Dev Ittycheria, who has served for 11 years [1] Company Summary - The leadership transition marks a significant change for MongoDB, as Ittycheria has been instrumental in the company's growth and strategy over the past decade [1] - The appointment of Desai is expected to bring new perspectives and strategies to the company, potentially impacting its future direction and performance [1]

Core Insights - MongoDB has appointed Chirantan Desai, previously the product and engineering head at Cloudflare, as its new CEO, effective November 10 [1] Company Summary - The new CEO, Chirantan Desai, brings experience from Cloudflare, indicating a strategic shift towards enhancing product and engineering capabilities at MongoDB [1]

Core Insights - Whales have adopted a bullish stance on MongoDB, with 41% of trades being bullish and 26% bearish [1] - The total amount for put trades is $412,301, while call trades amount to $1,839,776 [1] - Big players are targeting a price range for MongoDB between $140.0 and $500.0 over the past quarter [2] Options Activity - A snapshot of options activity shows significant interest in MongoDB's options, with trends in volume and open interest indicating liquidity and interest levels [3] - Recent significant options trades include a mix of bullish and bearish sentiments, with various strike prices and expiration dates [7] Company Overview - MongoDB, founded in 2007, offers a document-oriented database that accelerates application development, with options for fully managed (MongoDB Atlas) or self-managed (MongoDB Enterprise Advanced) services [8] - The free Community Server has achieved over 500 million downloads since 2009, highlighting its popularity among developers [9] Current Market Position - Analysts have set an average target price of $430.0 for MongoDB, with one analyst downgrading the rating to Overweight [10][11] - The current trading volume for MongoDB is 759,808, with a price increase of 1.82%, now at $339.64 [13]

Core Insights - The emergence of generative AI is seen as a transformative phase akin to the Fourth Industrial Revolution, significantly impacting various industries, including the database sector [2] - Oracle's stock surged by 36% on September 10, 2025, leading to a market capitalization increase of over $240 billion, attributed to a $300 billion five-year computing power procurement agreement with OpenAI [2] - The global AI server market is projected to grow from $125.1 billion in 2024 to $158.7 billion in 2025, and potentially reach $222.7 billion by 2028, indicating robust growth opportunities in the database industry [2] Industry Trends - The domestic database industry is experiencing new growth opportunities driven by both domestic substitution and the AI revolution [2] - The competition among domestic database providers has intensified, with companies like Nanda Tongyong (GBase) enhancing their product offerings to meet AI demands [4][8] - The shift from structured to unstructured data processing presents challenges for database companies, necessitating improvements in data handling capabilities [7] Company Developments - Nanda Tongyong has upgraded its core products to include vector data management, compute-storage separation, and AI Native capabilities, positioning itself to better meet enterprise needs in the AI era [4][8] - The company has established a comprehensive product line, including GBase 8s, GBase 8c, and GBase 8a, which are being applied in critical sectors such as finance, telecommunications, and energy [9] - GBase Cloud Data Warehouse (GCDW) is designed to efficiently manage and analyze massive datasets, supporting both on-premises and cloud deployments [10][11] Competitive Landscape - The domestic database market is entering a rapid growth phase, with the ability to adapt to AI becoming a critical competitive factor [13] - Nanda Tongyong aims to be the "data cornerstone of the AI era," leveraging advancements in data lake and warehouse integration, vector databases, and AI Native technologies [13][14] - The company has introduced intelligent operation and maintenance tools that significantly enhance efficiency in database management, reducing health check times and improving SQL optimization accuracy [15] Market Position - Nanda Tongyong ranks highly in various industry reports, being recognized as a leader in domestic analytical databases and independent databases [15] - The ongoing acceleration of domestic substitution and AI integration is expected to lead to a reshuffling in the database industry over the next two to three years, with product and operational capabilities being key competitive factors [15][16]

Market Opportunity and Growth - The data management software market is massive, exceeding $100 billion and continuing to grow[13] - MongoDB projects its revenue to be between approximately $2.34 billion and $2.36 billion, representing a year-over-year change of 17% to 18%[190] - MongoDB's Atlas revenue grew 29% quarter-over-quarter, demonstrating accelerated growth[188] - Customers with at least one AI use case contribute approximately 30% of Atlas ARR[32, 33] Product and Competitive Positioning - MongoDB is transitioning from stage 2.0 (~$40 million to ~$2 billion revenue) to stage 3.0 (~$2 billion to $5 billion+ revenue), focusing on redefining the database for the AI era[19, 20, 24] - MongoDB 8.0 achieved over 66% adoption among Atlas clusters and showed more than 2x faster adoption than version 7.0[62] - Customers using at least one additional capability of the Atlas platform account for 70% of total Atlas ARR[44] - Customers originally sourced through the self-serve channel account for 25% of customers with >$1 million ARR[167] Financial Performance and Targets - MongoDB's Q2 operating margin was 15%, showcasing leverage in the business model[188] - The company's cash conversion rate was 83% in Q2, indicating year-over-year improvement[188] - MongoDB aims for long-term financial targets including high teens average revenue growth, 20%+ operating margin, and 80%+ free cash flow conversion within 3-5 years[238]

Core Viewpoint - Oracle Corp. has experienced a significant stock price increase of 84% this year, driven by strong demand for AI computing and a projected 700% revenue growth in its cloud-computing business over the next three fiscal years [2][5] Group 1: Stock Performance - Oracle's stock performance ranks as the seventh-best in the S&P 500 Index, with a notable 36% increase following the revenue projection announcement on September 10 [2] - The current price-to-estimated earnings ratio for Oracle is 43 times, the highest since the dot-com era, making it more expensive than eight of the nine most valuable companies in the S&P 500 [4] Group 2: Market Position and Comparisons - Oracle has been linked to negotiations involving the Trump administration regarding TikTok, serving as its primary cloud infrastructure provider [3] - In comparison, Nvidia Corp. trades at 31 times projected profits, with expectations of faster sales growth, highlighting Oracle's relatively high valuation [4] Group 3: Analyst Perspectives - Analysts express caution regarding Oracle's stock valuation, noting that the anticipated growth is expected to materialize several years from now, which contributes to its high current valuation [5] - The long-term growth outlook suggests a more manageable earnings multiple of 25 times over the next three years, although this is still nearly double the average over the past decade [5][6] Group 4: Investor Sentiment - Investors are increasingly viewing Oracle as a potential AI winner, contrasting its previous perception as a low-growth company [5] - The willingness of investors to adopt a long-term view is evident, as seen with other growth stocks like Tesla and Palantir, which are priced significantly higher than Oracle [6]

Core Insights - Wedbush added MongoDB and Palo Alto Networks to their "best ideas list," highlighting their potential to benefit from the increasing demand for artificial intelligence [1][2] MongoDB - The target price for MongoDB's stock was raised to $400 from $300, which is one of the highest among analysts, indicating strong growth potential as AI benefits are still emerging [2] - Shares of MongoDB increased by approximately 36% through the end of August, outperforming the S&P 500's gain of roughly 11% during the same period [5] Palo Alto Networks - The target price for Palo Alto Networks was maintained at $225, slightly above the analyst mean of $217, with the recent stock drawdown viewed as a "golden buying opportunity" [2] - Palo Alto Networks is expected to benefit from rising cybersecurity demand due to AI-driven threats and aims to grow market share through its "one-stop shop" strategy and the acquisition of CyberArk [3][4] - Shares of Palo Alto Networks gained about 5% through the end of August [5] Wedbush Best Ideas List - The Wedbush list includes 14 companies, with notable names such as Apple, Microsoft, Amazon, and Tesla, and has risen more than 14% through the end of August [4][5]

Core Viewpoint - The latest earnings season has alleviated investor concerns regarding the artificial intelligence boom, highlighting robust growth outlooks and capital spending projections from tech companies [1] Group 1: Broadcom (AVGO) - Broadcom reported impressive fiscal third-quarter results, driven by AI demand, and secured a new customer worth $10 billion [3][4] - Analyst Harlan Sur from JPMorgan reaffirmed a buy rating on Broadcom, raising the price target to $400 from $325, citing strong fundamentals and accelerating AI demand [4][6] - Broadcom's AI revenue grew 18% sequentially in Q3 FY25, with guidance for a 19% quarter-over-quarter growth to $6.2 billion for Q4 [5][6] Group 2: Zscaler (ZS) - Zscaler delivered strong Q4 FY25 results, driven by demand for its Zero Trust and AI security solutions, prompting Stifel analyst Adam Borg to raise the price target to $330 from $295 [8][10] - The company experienced a 31% growth in remaining performance obligations (RPO), marking the fourth consecutive quarter of acceleration [10][11] - Borg expects Zscaler to maintain high-teens top-line growth and margin expansion, supported by its leading portfolio and emerging AI security solutions [11] Group 3: Oracle (ORCL) - Oracle's stock surged due to robust cloud growth projections, despite a Q1 earnings miss, with a 359% year-over-year growth in remaining performance obligations to $455 billion [13][14] - Analyst Brent Thill from Jefferies raised the price target to $360 from $270, emphasizing the significant growth in RPO and its implications for AI optimism [14][15] - Oracle's Cloud Infrastructure business is projected to grow by 77% to $18 billion in fiscal 2026, indicating rising demand for AI workloads [16]