Stock Traders Buy High Volume of Put Options on SAP (NYSE:SAP)

SAP SE (NYSE:SAP) was the recipient of some unusual options trading on Friday. Traders bought 5,494 put options on the stock. This is an increase of 136% compared to the typical volume of 2,329 put options.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several equities analysts have recently weighed in on SAP shares. KeyCorp reissued an “overweight” rating on shares of SAP in a research note on Thursday, October 23rd. BMO Capital Markets lowered their target price on SAP from $330.00 to $320.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a report on Thursday, October 23rd. Weiss Ratings restated a “buy (b-)” rating on shares of SAP in a research report on Friday, October 31st. Barclays lifted their price objective on SAP from $322.00 to $348.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research report on Friday, October 24th. Finally, Arete Research upgraded SAP to a “strong-buy” rating in a report on Thursday, December 11th. Two investment analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, fifteen have assigned a Buy rating and one has given a Hold rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has an average rating of “Buy” and a consensus target price of $284.33.

SAP Trading Down 0.9%

Shares of NYSE:SAP traded down $2.05 during midday trading on Friday, reaching $233.79. 666,579 shares of the company’s stock were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 1,579,444. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.14, a current ratio of 1.11 and a quick ratio of 1.10. The stock has a market cap of $293.47 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 34.93, a P/E/G ratio of 2.94 and a beta of 1.18. The firm’s 50 day simple moving average is $243.54 and its two-hundred day simple moving average is $266.18. SAP has a fifty-two week low of $231.91 and a fifty-two week high of $313.28.

SAP (NYSE:SAP) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, October 22nd. The software maker reported $1.86 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $1.69 by $0.17. SAP had a net margin of 19.50% and a return on equity of 15.69%. The firm had revenue of $10.65 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $9.10 billion. During the same period in the prior year, the business posted $1.23 EPS. The business’s revenue for the quarter was up 7.2% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, sell-side analysts forecast that SAP will post 6.55 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Institutional Trading of SAP

Several hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in SAP. Connor Clark & Lunn Investment Management Ltd. raised its holdings in SAP by 59.0% in the second quarter. Connor Clark & Lunn Investment Management Ltd. now owns 34,046 shares of the software maker’s stock valued at $10,353,000 after acquiring an additional 12,637 shares in the last quarter. Cidel Asset Management Inc. increased its position in shares of SAP by 20.2% in the 2nd quarter. Cidel Asset Management Inc. now owns 127,005 shares of the software maker’s stock valued at $38,622,000 after purchasing an additional 21,372 shares during the last quarter. JARISLOWSKY FRASER Ltd raised its holdings in shares of SAP by 14.2% in the 3rd quarter. JARISLOWSKY FRASER Ltd now owns 165,093 shares of the software maker’s stock valued at $44,114,000 after purchasing an additional 20,512 shares in the last quarter. US Bancorp DE grew its stake in shares of SAP by 12.4% during the second quarter. US Bancorp DE now owns 151,738 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $46,144,000 after purchasing an additional 16,726 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Journey Advisory Group LLC purchased a new position in SAP in the second quarter valued at $936,000.

About SAP

SAP SE is a global enterprise software company headquartered in Walldorf, Germany. Founded in 1972 by five former IBM engineers, the company’s name is an acronym for Systeme, Anwendungen und Produkte in der Datenverarbeitung (Systems, Applications & Products in Data Processing). SAP develops and sells software and services that help organizations manage business processes across finance, human resources, procurement, manufacturing, supply chain and customer relationships.

SAP’s product portfolio spans on‑premises and cloud offerings, anchored by its enterprise resource planning (ERP) solutions such as SAP S/4HANA and the SAP HANA in‑memory database and platform.