What Happened?
Shares of online work marketplace Upwork (NASDAQ: UPWK) jumped 2.7% in the morning session after positive analyst commentary highlighted signs of a business turnaround.
Citizens JMP raised its price target on the company to $27 from $20, keeping a Market Outperform rating. The firm pointed to Upwork's new enterprise platform, Lifted, as a potential multi-year growth driver that could expand its enterprise services and help it compete with traditional staffing firms.
This followed a similar move from the previous day when UBS increased its price target to $21 from $16. UBS noted that Upwork was close to a turning point in its Gross Services Volume, which measures total sales on its platform, after five straight quarters of declines. The firm believed that stabilizing sales was a key milestone that could reduce investor concerns about the impact of artificial intelligence on its business.
After the initial pop the shares cooled down to $19.81, up 0.7% from previous close.
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What Is The Market Telling Us
Upwork’s shares are very volatile and have had 20 moves greater than 5% over the last year. In that context, today’s move indicates the market considers this news meaningful but not something that would fundamentally change its perception of the business.
The previous big move we wrote about was about 24 hours ago when the stock gained 3.9% on the news that analyst firm UBS raised its price target on the company to $21 from $16, citing signs of a business turnaround.
Upwork is up 20.7% since the beginning of the year, and at $19.81 per share, it is trading close to its 52-week high of $20.07 from September 2025. Investors who bought $1,000 worth of Upwork’s shares 5 years ago would now be looking at an investment worth $1,300.
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