Analysts Set StoneCo Ltd. (NASDAQ:STNE) Price Target at $15.58

Shares of StoneCo Ltd. (NASDAQ:STNE) have been assigned a consensus rating of “Hold” from the ten research firms that are presently covering the stock, MarketBeat reports. Six investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and four have given a buy rating to the company. The average 1 year price target among brokers that have issued a report on the stock in the last year is $14.5857.

STNE has been the subject of several recent research reports. JPMorgan Chase & Co. cut their price objective on StoneCo from $20.00 to $16.50 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a report on Wednesday, May 27th. BTIG Research lowered their target price on StoneCo from $22.00 to $15.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research note on Friday, May 15th. Bank of America lowered StoneCo from a “buy” rating to a “neutral” rating and set a $13.00 target price on the stock. in a research report on Wednesday, July 15th. UBS Group cut their price target on StoneCo from $17.00 to $15.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research note on Friday, July 17th. Finally, Weiss Ratings lowered StoneCo from a “hold (c)” rating to a “hold (c-)” rating in a report on Thursday, June 18th.

Insider Buying and Selling

In related news, Director Silvio Jose Morais sold 9,000 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, June 12th. The shares were sold at an average price of $11.29, for a total transaction of $101,610.00. Following the transaction, the director owned 21,000 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $237,090. This trade represents a 30.00% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through the SEC website. Corporate insiders own 11.25% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Several hedge funds have recently modified their holdings of STNE. Handelsbanken Fonder AB raised its holdings in shares of StoneCo by 3.4% during the 2nd quarter. Handelsbanken Fonder AB now owns 43,097 shares of the company’s stock valued at $467,000 after purchasing an additional 1,400 shares in the last quarter. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. boosted its holdings in StoneCo by 1,288.4% in the second quarter. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. now owns 577,959 shares of the company’s stock worth $6,265,000 after purchasing an additional 536,331 shares in the last quarter. Versant Capital Management Inc boosted its holdings in StoneCo by 54.4% in the second quarter. Versant Capital Management Inc now owns 3,032 shares of the company’s stock worth $33,000 after purchasing an additional 1,068 shares in the last quarter. Lombard Odier Asset Management Europe Ltd acquired a new position in StoneCo during the first quarter worth $1,836,000. Finally, Bank of America Corp DE increased its position in StoneCo by 151.7% during the first quarter. Bank of America Corp DE now owns 6,032,572 shares of the company’s stock worth $85,180,000 after buying an additional 3,636,276 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 73.19% of the company’s stock.

StoneCo Stock Performance

Shares of STNE opened at $10.98 on Friday. The company has a market capitalization of $2.73 billion, a PE ratio of 4.39, a PEG ratio of 0.33 and a beta of 1.73. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.57, a quick ratio of 1.33 and a current ratio of 1.33. The company’s 50 day moving average price is $10.94 and its 200 day moving average price is $13.32. StoneCo has a 52 week low of $9.45 and a 52 week high of $19.95.

StoneCo (NASDAQ:STNE) last released its earnings results on Wednesday, May 13th. The company reported $0.42 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, hitting analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.42. StoneCo had a net margin of 23.82% and a return on equity of 21.05%. The company had revenue of $141.16 million during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $675.11 million. Research analysts expect that StoneCo will post 2.27 EPS for the current fiscal year.

StoneCo Company Profile

StoneCo Ltd., commonly known as Stone, is a Brazilian financial technology company that provides integrated digital payment solutions and related financial services to merchants. Through its cloud-based platform, Stone enables businesses of all sizes to accept a variety of payment methods, including point-of-sale (POS) terminals, mobile card readers and e-commerce gateways. In addition to payment acceptance, the company offers value-added services such as working capital loans, digital banking products and automated billing tools designed to help merchants manage cash flow and streamline operations.

Since its founding in 2012 by André Street and Eduardo Pontes, Stone has focused on serving over half a million merchants across Brazil’s retail, restaurant and services sectors.