Insider Selling: Nkarta (NASDAQ:NKTX) CEO Sells $53,915.22 in Stock

Nkarta, Inc. (NASDAQ:NKTX) CEO Paul Hastings sold 26,046 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Thursday, January 15th. The stock was sold at an average price of $2.07, for a total transaction of $53,915.22. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer directly owned 390,023 shares in the company, valued at $807,347.61. This represents a 6.26% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this hyperlink.

Nkarta Trading Up 9.1%

NASDAQ:NKTX opened at $2.40 on Friday. The stock has a 50 day moving average of $1.89 and a 200-day moving average of $2.03. The firm has a market capitalization of $170.47 million, a PE ratio of -1.74 and a beta of 0.60. Nkarta, Inc. has a 52 week low of $1.31 and a 52 week high of $2.74.

Nkarta (NASDAQ:NKTX) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Monday, November 10th. The company reported ($0.29) earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of ($0.32) by $0.03. As a group, analysts predict that Nkarta, Inc. will post -1.7 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On Nkarta

Several large investors have recently bought and sold shares of the stock. Savant Capital LLC acquired a new stake in shares of Nkarta in the 2nd quarter worth approximately $36,000. SG Americas Securities LLC raised its holdings in Nkarta by 35.0% during the third quarter. SG Americas Securities LLC now owns 23,663 shares of the company’s stock worth $49,000 after purchasing an additional 6,141 shares in the last quarter. Bailard Inc. acquired a new stake in Nkarta in the third quarter worth approximately $61,000. CWM LLC boosted its stake in Nkarta by 23.4% during the 2nd quarter. CWM LLC now owns 34,758 shares of the company’s stock valued at $58,000 after purchasing an additional 6,601 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Forefront Analytics LLC boosted its stake in Nkarta by 41.0% during the 3rd quarter. Forefront Analytics LLC now owns 39,452 shares of the company’s stock valued at $82,000 after purchasing an additional 11,473 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 80.54% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of analysts recently weighed in on the stock. Stifel Nicolaus dropped their price objective on shares of Nkarta from $12.00 to $11.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a report on Tuesday, November 11th. Weiss Ratings restated a “sell (d-)” rating on shares of Nkarta in a research report on Monday, December 29th. Finally, Wall Street Zen upgraded shares of Nkarta from a “sell” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Saturday, December 20th. Four analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating, one has issued a Hold rating and one has issued a Sell rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $13.25.

Nkarta Company Profile

Nkarta, Inc is a clinical-stage biotechnology company specializing in the development of off-the-shelf natural killer (NK) cell therapies for the treatment of cancer. Leveraging proprietary activation and expansion technologies, Nkarta aims to harness the innate tumor-killing properties of NK cells while incorporating targeted immuno-engineering approaches to enhance safety, potency and persistence in patients. The company’s platform supports both allogeneic cell manufacturing and genetic modifications to generate chimeric antigen receptor-expressing NK cell candidates designed to address a range of hematologic and solid tumors.

Nkarta’s lead program, NKX019, is an anti-CD19 CAR-NK cell therapy in early-phase clinical trials for relapsed or refractory B-cell malignancies.