Jefferies upgrades UK's Alphawave IP Group on potential Qualcomm acquisition; shares fall

Shares of British semiconductor company Alphawave IP Group AWE.L down 1.7% at 135.3p

Jefferies upgrades AWE to "Buy" from "Hold", citing a potential bid from Qualcomm QCOM.O as a key driver for the upgrade

Brokerage raises PT to 160p from 108p, representing a nearly 17% upside to the stock's last close

U.S. chipmaker Qualcomm said on Tuesday it is considering making an offer to acquire Alphawave, which designs and licenses semiconductor technology for data centers, networking, and storage

Jefferies says, "We believe such a bid is likely, as the acquisition would provide Qualcomm with an entry into the data center segment through both Networking chips and custom ASIC solutions"

Stock rated "Buy" on avg; median PT is 162.5p, per data compiled by LSEG

Stock up ~63% so far this year