BlackBerry Limited (NYSE:BB) Short Interest Update

BlackBerry Limited (NYSE:BB) was the target of a large increase in short interest in the month of December. As of December 31st, there was short interest totalling 29,500,000 shares, an increase of 7.1% from the December 15th total of 27,540,000 shares. Approximately 5.1% of the company’s shares are short sold. Based on an average trading volume of 13,000,000 shares, the short-interest ratio is presently 2.3 days.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

A number of brokerages have weighed in on BB. CIBC raised their price objective on BlackBerry from $3.50 to $3.60 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note on Thursday, October 17th. Royal Bank of Canada raised their price target on shares of BlackBerry from $3.25 to $4.00 and gave the stock a “sector perform” rating in a research report on Friday, January 10th. Robert W. Baird upped their price target on shares of BlackBerry from $3.00 to $3.50 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a report on Friday, December 20th. StockNews.com raised shares of BlackBerry from a “sell” rating to a “hold” rating in a report on Monday, December 9th. Finally, Canaccord Genuity Group boosted their target price on shares of BlackBerry from $2.80 to $3.00 and gave the stock a “hold” rating in a research report on Friday, December 20th. Six equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, three have issued a buy rating and one has issued a strong buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, BlackBerry currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $3.69.

Insider Activity

In other news, insider Mattias Eriksson sold 12,680 shares of BlackBerry stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, January 6th. The shares were sold at an average price of $4.00, for a total transaction of $50,720.00. Following the sale, the insider now owns 278,306 shares in the company, valued at $1,113,224. This trade represents a 4.36 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available at this hyperlink. Also, CEO John Joseph Giamatteo sold 155,815 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Thursday, January 2nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $3.68, for a total transaction of $573,399.20. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer now directly owns 385,552 shares in the company, valued at approximately $1,418,831.36. The trade was a 28.78 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last 90 days, insiders have sold 219,796 shares of company stock valued at $823,314. Company insiders own 0.34% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On BlackBerry

A number of hedge funds have recently added to or reduced their stakes in BB. EP Wealth Advisors LLC acquired a new position in BlackBerry during the 2nd quarter worth $28,000. Northwestern Mutual Wealth Management Co. raised its stake in shares of BlackBerry by 83.3% during the second quarter. Northwestern Mutual Wealth Management Co. now owns 11,769 shares of the company’s stock valued at $29,000 after purchasing an additional 5,349 shares in the last quarter. Quantinno Capital Management LP acquired a new stake in BlackBerry in the third quarter worth about $38,000. Ballentine Partners LLC bought a new position in BlackBerry in the 4th quarter valued at about $65,000. Finally, International Assets Investment Management LLC increased its stake in BlackBerry by 60.7% during the 3rd quarter. International Assets Investment Management LLC now owns 20,769 shares of the company’s stock valued at $540,000 after buying an additional 7,842 shares during the period. 54.48% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

BlackBerry Stock Performance

Shares of NYSE BB traded down $0.23 during midday trading on Friday, hitting $3.99. The company’s stock had a trading volume of 17,287,846 shares, compared to its average volume of 16,549,552. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.27, a quick ratio of 1.37 and a current ratio of 1.37. BlackBerry has a 1-year low of $2.01 and a 1-year high of $4.35. The firm’s fifty day moving average price is $3.17 and its 200-day moving average price is $2.66. The firm has a market cap of $2.36 billion, a P/E ratio of -18.11 and a beta of 1.30.

BlackBerry (NYSE:BB) last posted its earnings results on Thursday, December 19th. The company reported $0.02 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of ($0.01) by $0.03. The company had revenue of $143.00 million during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $144.84 million. BlackBerry had a negative return on equity of 2.02% and a negative net margin of 21.16%. The business’s revenue was down 5.9% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the prior year, the company earned $0.01 earnings per share. On average, sell-side analysts forecast that BlackBerry will post -0.03 EPS for the current fiscal year.

About BlackBerry

BlackBerry Limited provides intelligent security software and services to enterprises and governments worldwide. The company operates through three segments: Cybersecurity, IoT, and Licensing and Other. The company offers CylanceENDPOINT, an integrated endpoint security solution; CylanceGUARD, a managed detection and response solution; CylanceEDGE, an AI-powered continuous authentication zero trust network access solution; CylanceINTELLIGENCE, a contextual cyber threat intelligence service; BlackBerry Dynamics offers a development platform and secure container for mobile applications; BlackBerry Workspaces a secure Enterprise File Sync and Share (EFSS) solution; BlackBerry Messenger (BBM) Enterprise, an enterprise-grade secure instant messaging solution for messaging, voice and video; BlackBerry SecuSUITE is a certified, multi-OS voice and text messaging solution; BlackBerry AtHoc, a secure networked critical event management solution; and BlackBerry unified endpoint management (UEM) solutions.