Backblaze (NASDAQ:BLZE) Cut to Hold at Wall Street Zen

Wall Street Zen cut shares of Backblaze (NASDAQ:BLZE) from a buy rating to a hold rating in a research report released on Saturday,Wall Street Zen reports.

Other equities analysts also recently issued reports about the stock. Oppenheimer increased their price objective on shares of Backblaze from $15.00 to $25.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note on Tuesday, August 4th. Citizens Jmp upped their target price on Backblaze from $16.00 to $21.00 and gave the stock a “market outperform” rating in a report on Tuesday, August 4th. Craig Hallum raised Backblaze from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating and increased their target price for the company from $6.50 to $16.00 in a research report on Tuesday, June 23rd. B. Riley Financial lifted their price target on Backblaze from $16.00 to $24.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Tuesday, August 4th. Finally, William Blair raised Backblaze from an “underperform” rating to a “market perform” rating in a research report on Tuesday, June 23rd. Eight analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating, one has given a Hold rating and one has assigned a Sell rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, the company has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $19.71.

Backblaze Trading Up 3.3%

Shares of NASDAQ BLZE opened at $13.60 on Friday. Backblaze has a twelve month low of $3.26 and a twelve month high of $23.99. The firm has a market cap of $841.84 million, a PE ratio of -40.00 and a beta of 1.56. The business has a fifty day simple moving average of $14.95 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $9.90. The company has a quick ratio of 1.00, a current ratio of 1.00 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.34.

Backblaze (NASDAQ:BLZE) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Monday, August 3rd. The company reported $0.08 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.02 by $0.06. Backblaze had a negative return on equity of 16.73% and a negative net margin of 13.07%.The firm had revenue of $42.71 million for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $39.94 million. Analysts expect that Backblaze will post -0.28 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Insider Buying and Selling

In related news, CFO Marc Suidan sold 2,110 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, August 21st. The shares were sold at an average price of $15.82, for a total transaction of $33,380.20. Following the completion of the sale, the chief financial officer owned 349,518 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $5,529,374.76. This represents a 0.60% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available at this link. The sale was made to cover tax withholding obligations related to the vesting of equity awards. Also, CEO Gleb Budman sold 12,855 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, August 21st. The shares were sold at an average price of $15.82, for a total transaction of $203,366.10. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer owned 2,192,103 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $34,679,069.46. This trade represents a 0.58% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale is available in the SEC filing. The sale was made to cover tax withholding obligations related to the vesting of equity awards. Corporate insiders own 4.20% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Trading of Backblaze

A number of institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in the business. Whetstone Capital Advisors LLC grew its stake in Backblaze by 4.1% during the 4th quarter. Whetstone Capital Advisors LLC now owns 1,520,055 shares of the company’s stock worth $7,083,000 after buying an additional 59,263 shares during the last quarter. AWM Investment Company Inc. purchased a new stake in shares of Backblaze during the second quarter worth about $22,207,000. Renaissance Technologies LLC grew its stake in shares of Backblaze by 44.6% during the first quarter. Renaissance Technologies LLC now owns 1,172,657 shares of the company’s stock worth $4,046,000 after acquiring an additional 361,905 shares during the last quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP increased its holdings in shares of Backblaze by 152.3% during the first quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP now owns 517,586 shares of the company’s stock valued at $1,785,000 after acquiring an additional 312,459 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Perkins Capital Management Inc. increased its holdings in shares of Backblaze by 21.6% during the first quarter. Perkins Capital Management Inc. now owns 339,025 shares of the company’s stock valued at $1,170,000 after acquiring an additional 60,250 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 54.03% of the company’s stock.

Backblaze Company Profile

Backblaze, Inc provides cloud storage and data backup services for businesses, developers and individual users. Its platform is designed to help customers store, protect, manage and recover data through scalable cloud-based infrastructure.

The company’s principal offerings include Backblaze B2 Cloud Storage, an object-storage service used for applications, content distribution, backup, archiving and disaster recovery, and Backblaze Computer Backup, which helps individuals and organizations back up data from computers.