Pegasystems (NASDAQ:PEGA) Stock Price Down 4.5% – Time to Sell?

Pegasystems Inc. (NASDAQ:PEGA) shares fell 4.5% during mid-day trading on Wednesday . The company traded as low as $31.63 and last traded at $31.5720. 80,016 shares traded hands during trading, a decline of 97% from the average daily volume of 2,408,641 shares. The stock had previously closed at $33.07.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several equities analysts recently issued reports on PEGA shares. Weiss Ratings cut shares of Pegasystems from a “hold (c+)” rating to a “hold (c)” rating in a research note on Thursday, June 4th. Citigroup downgraded Pegasystems from a “market outperform” rating to a “market perform” rating in a research report on Wednesday, July 22nd. DA Davidson set a $32.00 price target on shares of Pegasystems and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research report on Friday, July 24th. KeyCorp lowered Pegasystems from an “overweight” rating to a “sector weight” rating in a research note on Wednesday, July 22nd. Finally, Wedbush reissued an “outperform” rating and issued a $60.00 price target on shares of Pegasystems in a research note on Thursday, April 23rd. Six equities research analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and seven have issued a Hold rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock has an average rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $50.10.

Pegasystems Stock Up 6.8%

The stock has a fifty day moving average of $31.18 and a 200-day moving average of $37.26. The stock has a market capitalization of $5.51 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 18.92 and a beta of 0.87.

Pegasystems (NASDAQ:PEGA) last released its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, July 21st. The technology company reported $0.35 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.43 by ($0.08). The firm had revenue of $420.72 million for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $427.38 million. Pegasystems had a return on equity of 32.21% and a net margin of 18.66%.The company’s quarterly revenue was up 9.4% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the prior year, the business earned $0.28 EPS. On average, equities analysts forecast that Pegasystems Inc. will post 1.71 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Pegasystems Dividend Announcement

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, July 15th. Stockholders of record on Wednesday, July 1st were given a dividend of $0.03 per share. This represents a $0.12 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.4%. The ex-dividend date was Wednesday, July 1st. Pegasystems’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 6.78%.

Insider Transactions at Pegasystems

In other news, CAO Efstathios A. Kouninis sold 750 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, June 1st. The shares were sold at an average price of $36.99, for a total value of $27,742.50. Following the sale, the chief accounting officer directly owned 2,144 shares in the company, valued at $79,306.56. This represents a 25.92% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through the SEC website. Also, insider Rifat Kerim Akgonul sold 4,545 shares of Pegasystems stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, May 19th. The stock was sold at an average price of $33.35, for a total value of $151,575.75. Following the sale, the insider owned 107,070 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $3,570,784.50. This represents a 4.07% decrease in their position. The SEC filing for this sale provides additional information. Over the last three months, insiders sold 6,795 shares of company stock worth $229,613. 48.40% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Several hedge funds have recently added to or reduced their stakes in PEGA. BlackRock Inc. acquired a new position in shares of Pegasystems in the second quarter worth about $286,923,000. AQR Capital Management LLC boosted its holdings in shares of Pegasystems by 236.2% in the 2nd quarter. AQR Capital Management LLC now owns 4,037,552 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $217,584,000 after buying an additional 2,836,733 shares during the period. Invesco Ltd. boosted its stake in Pegasystems by 14.8% in the fourth quarter. Invesco Ltd. now owns 3,127,771 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $186,790,000 after acquiring an additional 402,763 shares during the period. State Street Corp grew its stake in Pegasystems by 255.3% during the 2nd quarter. State Street Corp now owns 2,907,677 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $157,393,000 after buying an additional 2,089,375 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Wellington Management Group LLP increased its holdings in shares of Pegasystems by 28.3% in the 4th quarter. Wellington Management Group LLP now owns 2,721,958 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $162,555,000 after acquiring an additional 599,790 shares during the period. 46.89% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

About Pegasystems

Pegasystems Inc is a software company specializing in customer engagement and digital process automation solutions. Headquartered in Cambridge, Massachusetts, Pegasystems develops enterprise applications designed to help organizations streamline operations, manage customer interactions and automate complex workflows. Its platform supports a wide range of use cases, from sales and marketing optimization to case management and robotic process automation.

The core of Pegasystems’ offering is the Pega Platform, a low-code development environment that enables businesses to build and deploy applications with minimal hand-coding.