Piper Sandler Reaffirms “Overweight” Rating for Moderna (NASDAQ:MRNA)

Piper Sandler reiterated their overweight rating on shares of Moderna (NASDAQ:MRNA) in a report published on Friday, Benzinga reports. The brokerage currently has a $157.00 target price on the stock, down from their prior target price of $214.00.

A number of other equities analysts also recently commented on MRNA. William Blair reaffirmed a market perform rating on shares of Moderna in a report on Thursday, June 27th. UBS Group boosted their price objective on Moderna from $143.00 to $151.00 and gave the company a buy rating in a research report on Tuesday, May 7th. Evercore ISI reissued an in-line rating and set a $120.00 price target on shares of Moderna in a report on Thursday, June 27th. Royal Bank of Canada upped their target price on shares of Moderna from $135.00 to $160.00 and gave the stock an outperform rating in a research report on Monday, June 3rd. Finally, Oppenheimer upped their price objective on shares of Moderna from $163.00 to $179.00 and gave the stock an outperform rating in a report on Wednesday, June 12th. Two analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, seven have assigned a hold rating and seven have issued a buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat.com, Moderna presently has an average rating of Hold and an average target price of $122.79.

Moderna Stock Down 1.7 %

MRNA stock traded down $1.46 during mid-day trading on Friday, hitting $82.29. 4,430,624 shares of the company were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 4,157,348. The company has a market capitalization of $31.54 billion, a PE ratio of -5.19 and a beta of 1.67. The firm has a fifty day simple moving average of $129.81 and a 200 day simple moving average of $115.22. The company has a current ratio of 4.09, a quick ratio of 3.91 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.05. Moderna has a twelve month low of $62.55 and a twelve month high of $170.47.

Moderna (NASDAQ:MRNA) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, August 1st. The company reported ($3.33) earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of ($3.47) by $0.14. Moderna had a negative return on equity of 21.35% and a negative net margin of 116.18%. The firm had revenue of $241.00 million during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $128.41 million. During the same period in the previous year, the company earned ($3.62) earnings per share. Moderna’s quarterly revenue was down 29.9% on a year-over-year basis. On average, research analysts forecast that Moderna will post -7.46 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, President Stephen Hoge sold 255 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, May 10th. The stock was sold at an average price of $120.96, for a total value of $30,844.80. Following the completion of the sale, the president now directly owns 1,486,508 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $179,808,007.68. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is accessible through this hyperlink. In related news, President Stephen Hoge sold 255 shares of Moderna stock in a transaction dated Friday, May 10th. The stock was sold at an average price of $120.96, for a total value of $30,844.80. Following the sale, the president now owns 1,486,508 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $179,808,007.68. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available through this hyperlink. Also, insider Shannon Thyme Klinger sold 1,296 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, May 28th. The shares were sold at an average price of $162.47, for a total value of $210,561.12. Following the completion of the transaction, the insider now owns 10,623 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $1,725,918.81. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold 396,239 shares of company stock worth $55,563,937 over the last 90 days. Corporate insiders own 15.70% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently modified their holdings of the company. Ogorek Anthony Joseph NY ADV acquired a new stake in Moderna in the 4th quarter valued at about $27,000. Arlington Trust Co LLC boosted its stake in shares of Moderna by 4,833.3% during the 4th quarter. Arlington Trust Co LLC now owns 296 shares of the company’s stock worth $29,000 after acquiring an additional 290 shares during the period. Cedar Wealth Management LLC increased its holdings in shares of Moderna by 45.0% during the 1st quarter. Cedar Wealth Management LLC now owns 290 shares of the company’s stock worth $31,000 after acquiring an additional 90 shares during the last quarter. Westside Investment Management Inc. bought a new stake in Moderna in the 1st quarter valued at $32,000. Finally, Family Firm Inc. acquired a new stake in Moderna during the 2nd quarter valued at $33,000. Institutional investors own 75.33% of the company’s stock.

Moderna Company Profile

Moderna, Inc, a biotechnology company, discovers, develops, and commercializes messenger RNA therapeutics and vaccines for the treatment of infectious diseases, immuno-oncology, rare diseases, autoimmune, and cardiovascular diseases in the United States, Europe, and internationally. Its respiratory vaccines include COVID-19, influenza, and respiratory syncytial virus, spikevax, and hMPV/PIV3 vaccines; latent vaccines comprise cytomegalovirus, epstein-barr virus, herpes simplex virus, varicella zoster virus, and human immunodeficiency virus vaccines; public health vaccines consists of Zika, Nipah, Mpox vaccines; and infectious diseases vaccines, such as lyme and norovirus vaccines.