Louisiana State Employees Retirement System Purchases Shares of 25,900 Yelp Inc. $YELP

Louisiana State Employees Retirement System purchased a new position in shares of Yelp Inc. (NYSE:YELP) during the 1st quarter, Holdings Channel reports. The fund purchased 25,900 shares of the local business review company’s stock, valued at approximately $641,000.

A number of other large investors also recently modified their holdings of YELP. LSV Asset Management grew its holdings in shares of Yelp by 11.6% in the 4th quarter. LSV Asset Management now owns 2,682,238 shares of the local business review company’s stock valued at $81,513,000 after acquiring an additional 279,300 shares in the last quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP raised its holdings in Yelp by 7.6% during the fourth quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP now owns 2,226,666 shares of the local business review company’s stock worth $67,666,000 after acquiring an additional 156,430 shares in the last quarter. Arrowstreet Capital Limited Partnership boosted its position in Yelp by 8.3% during the third quarter. Arrowstreet Capital Limited Partnership now owns 1,976,150 shares of the local business review company’s stock valued at $61,656,000 after purchasing an additional 151,354 shares during the last quarter. Ameriprise Financial Inc. boosted its position in Yelp by 7.0% during the second quarter. Ameriprise Financial Inc. now owns 1,501,764 shares of the local business review company’s stock valued at $51,458,000 after purchasing an additional 98,303 shares during the last quarter. Finally, River Road Asset Management LLC grew its stake in Yelp by 1.4% in the fourth quarter. River Road Asset Management LLC now owns 1,161,711 shares of the local business review company’s stock valued at $35,304,000 after purchasing an additional 15,849 shares in the last quarter. 90.11% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several research firms have weighed in on YELP. Weiss Ratings reaffirmed a “sell (d+)” rating on shares of Yelp in a research report on Monday, May 11th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. raised their target price on shares of Yelp from $22.00 to $26.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Friday, May 8th. Zacks Research raised shares of Yelp from a “strong sell” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Thursday, May 14th. Morgan Stanley lowered their target price on shares of Yelp from $28.00 to $24.00 and set an “underweight” rating on the stock in a report on Friday, May 15th. Finally, Robert W. Baird set a $28.00 price target on shares of Yelp in a research report on Friday, May 8th. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a Buy rating, four have assigned a Hold rating and three have assigned a Sell rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, the company currently has a consensus rating of “Reduce” and a consensus price target of $27.88.

Yelp Price Performance

NYSE:YELP opened at $26.58 on Wednesday. The company has a quick ratio of 1.74, a current ratio of 1.74 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.21. The stock’s 50 day moving average price is $24.18 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $25.49. The firm has a market capitalization of $1.46 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 12.14, a P/E/G ratio of 2.82 and a beta of 0.46. Yelp Inc. has a 12-month low of $19.60 and a 12-month high of $35.39.

Yelp (NYSE:YELP) last released its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, May 7th. The local business review company reported $0.30 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.26 by $0.04. Yelp had a return on equity of 20.19% and a net margin of 9.47%.The company had revenue of $361.46 million during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $353.47 million. During the same period last year, the firm posted $0.36 earnings per share. The business’s revenue was up .8% on a year-over-year basis. On average, analysts anticipate that Yelp Inc. will post 1.85 earnings per share for the current year.

Insider Buying and Selling at Yelp

In other Yelp news, Director Christine Barone sold 15,507 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Monday, June 1st. The stock was sold at an average price of $22.95, for a total transaction of $355,885.65. Following the completion of the sale, the director owned 15,928 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $365,547.60. This trade represents a 49.33% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available through this hyperlink. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Also, CFO David A. Schwarzbach sold 7,500 shares of Yelp stock in a transaction on Wednesday, April 15th. The stock was sold at an average price of $26.60, for a total transaction of $199,500.00. Following the transaction, the chief financial officer directly owned 209,300 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $5,567,380. This trade represents a 3.46% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The SEC filing for this sale provides additional information. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Insiders have sold a total of 25,007 shares of company stock valued at $601,981 in the last ninety days. Insiders own 8.30% of the company’s stock.

About Yelp

Yelp is a digital platform that connects consumers with local businesses through user-generated reviews, ratings and multimedia content. The company’s flagship offerings include the Yelp website and mobile applications for iOS and Android, where users can search for and discover restaurants, shops, service providers and other points of interest. In addition to crowd-sourced reviews and photographs, Yelp provides business profile pages featuring hours, contact information, menus and direct messaging capabilities.

Yelp generates revenue primarily through advertising services sold to small and medium-sized enterprises.