Relx PLC

RELX PLC has been upgraded to a Zacks Rank #2 (Buy), a rating driven by an upward trend in earnings estimates. For the fiscal year ending December 2026, the company is expected to earn $1.93 per share, unchanged from the year-ago reported number, while the Zacks Consensus Estimate has risen 1% over the past three months. The upgrade places RELX in the top 20% of the more than 4,000 stocks covered by the Zacks Rank system, which assigns its Strong Buy rating to only the top 5% and its Buy rating to the next 15%. Zacks said the rating change reflects an improving earnings outlook that could lift the stock in the near term.

US tech stocks fell sharply on Monday after Anthropic chief executive Dario Amodei called for tech companies to reduce the speed of AI development, a call backed by OpenAI boss Sam Altman, Elon Musk and Google DeepMind chairman Sir Demis Hassabis. The Nasdaq Composite dropped as much as 1.3pc to 25,992.54, with Sandisk, Intel and Micron all falling more than 6pc and Nvidia, the world's largest company by market value, down 3.8pc; the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell as much as 0.4pc to 52,385.52 and the S&P 500 declined 0.8pc to 7,597.05. Donald Trump rejected the calls, writing on Truth Social that there is a "SICK conspiracy going on against AI and Data Centers," while Vice-President JD Vance called the industry's requests for regulation "a Trojan horse." In Europe, the Cac 40 in France, the Dax in Germany and the Ibex 35 in Spain each fell 0.6pc, with Germany's Infineon down 7.2pc and Dutch companies ASML and ASMI losing 4.8pc and 8.1pc respectively, while the FTSE 100 rose 0.6pc as software stocks including Sage, Relx and London Stock Exchange Group gained. OpenAI separately called on the UK Government to introduce mandatory safety rules for major AI developers, with the AI Security Institute playing a central role in third-party testing, and Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney called for a global "technology stability board" modelled on the Financial Stability Board.

The UK's FTSE 100 index rose 0.59% on Tuesday, driven by a strong rally in Unilever shares after the consumer goods giant reported better-than-expected earnings and raised its full-year guidance. The benchmark was up 63.90 points at 10,845.65 nearly half an hour past noon. Unilever climbed nearly 8% as it upgraded its full-year underlying sales growth guidance to the 4% to 6% range from its previous expectation of growth at the bottom end of the range, supported by around 3% underlying volume growth, and reported its best quarter of sales volume growth in 16 years. Other notable gainers included Admiral Group up over 4%, Relx up 3.6%, and Compass Group, Diageo, Imperial Brands, Croda International, Babcock International, Reckitt Benckiser, The Sage Group, and Experian climbing between 2.5% and 3%. Barclays Group shed more than 5% after reporting increased second-quarter operating costs, while Natwest Group and Lloyds Banking Group both eased about 1.3%. In economic news, UK shop price inflation rose 0.9% year-on-year in July 2026, missing expectations of 1.2% and marking the slowest increase since December 2025.

RELX PLC has announced an irrevocable, non-discretionary programme to repurchase its ordinary shares between 23 July 2026 and 4 September 2026, with a spend of £150 million. This follows the completion of a £100 million non-discretionary programme on 21 July 2026, both forming part of the £2.25 billion to be deployed on share buybacks in 2026 as announced on 12 February 2026. The programme aims to reduce the company's capital, with purchased shares held in treasury. ABN AMRO Bank N.V. has been appointed to manage the programme independently under irrevocable instructions.

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RELX PLC is trading at a significant valuation discount, with a forward price-to-earnings ratio of roughly 17.5 times compared to a historical average closer to 30 times, according to a bullish thesis by James Emanuel on Rock & Turner's Substack. The company, which provides information-based analytics and decision tools, has expanded adjusted operating margins to 34.8% and generates near 100% cash conversion. Analysts imply an upside of approximately 47% to £36.39, while longer-term scenarios suggest over 150% total shareholder returns if the stock re-rates toward historical multiples. RELX's business model is supported by deep integration into customer workflows, high switching costs, and recurring revenue, with structural digitisation and AI adoption enhancing its competitive moat.

Goldman Sachs initiated coverage of RELX PLC with a Buy rating and a price target of 3,000 GBp. The firm stated that the company is being misplaced in the AI "at risk" category and has a strong moat, adding that its new suite of AI products should lead to an acceleration in sales growth toward 8%. Morgan Stanley downgraded RELX to Equal Weight from Overweight on May 7, lowering its price target to 2,970 GBp from 3,320 GBp, citing valuation and a more balanced risk/reward.