Block, Inc. (NYSE:XYZ) Receives Consensus Rating of “Moderate Buy” from Analysts

Block, Inc. (NYSE:XYZ) has earned a consensus recommendation of “Moderate Buy” from the thirty-seven research firms that are currently covering the stock, Marketbeat reports. One analyst has rated the stock with a sell recommendation, twelve have issued a hold recommendation, twenty-one have issued a buy recommendation and three have assigned a strong buy recommendation to the company. The average 1-year price objective among brokerages that have issued a report on the stock in the last year is $83.4242.

A number of brokerages have recently issued reports on XYZ. Oppenheimer restated an “outperform” rating and issued a $85.00 target price on shares of Block in a research note on Friday, November 7th. Weiss Ratings reiterated a “hold (c)” rating on shares of Block in a research note on Monday, December 8th. Compass Point upgraded Block from a “strong sell” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Friday, November 21st. Needham & Company LLC reaffirmed a “buy” rating and set a $80.00 price target on shares of Block in a report on Monday, November 24th. Finally, Morgan Stanley boosted their price objective on Block from $71.00 to $72.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Friday, November 21st.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Block news, CFO Amrita Ahuja sold 9,959 shares of Block stock in a transaction on Friday, November 21st. The shares were sold at an average price of $61.40, for a total transaction of $611,482.60. Following the completion of the sale, the chief financial officer owned 272,965 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $16,760,051. The trade was a 3.52% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through the SEC website. Also, insider Chrysty Esperanza sold 3,608 shares of the stock in a transaction on Friday, November 21st. The shares were sold at an average price of $61.40, for a total value of $221,531.20. Following the completion of the transaction, the insider directly owned 123,198 shares in the company, valued at approximately $7,564,357.20. This trade represents a 2.85% decrease in their position. The SEC filing for this sale provides additional information. Insiders have sold 99,198 shares of company stock valued at $6,968,155 over the last 90 days. Corporate insiders own 10.85% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

A number of institutional investors have recently bought and sold shares of the company. Vanguard Group Inc. acquired a new stake in shares of Block during the second quarter worth about $3,730,489,000. Sands Capital Management LLC acquired a new stake in Block during the 2nd quarter worth approximately $702,446,000. Geode Capital Management LLC acquired a new position in shares of Block in the second quarter valued at approximately $634,721,000. Dragoneer Investment Group LLC bought a new stake in shares of Block during the second quarter worth $627,233,000. Finally, Ameriprise Financial Inc. bought a new stake in shares of Block during the second quarter worth $535,305,000. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 70.44% of the company’s stock.

Block Trading Up 1.8%

Shares of Block stock opened at $64.74 on Friday. The company has a market cap of $39.34 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 13.05, a PEG ratio of 2.57 and a beta of 2.65. Block has a 1 year low of $44.27 and a 1 year high of $95.78. The company’s fifty day simple moving average is $69.42 and its 200-day simple moving average is $71.14. The company has a current ratio of 2.18, a quick ratio of 2.18 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.25.

Block (NYSE:XYZ) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, November 6th. The technology company reported $0.54 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.25 by $0.29. The company had revenue of $6.11 billion for the quarter. Block had a return on equity of 5.54% and a net margin of 12.99%.Block’s revenue for the quarter was up 2.3% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the previous year, the business posted $0.53 EPS. As a group, sell-side analysts expect that Block will post 2.54 EPS for the current year.

Block Company Profile

Square, Inc provides payment and point-of-sale solutions in the United States and internationally. The company's commerce ecosystem includes point-of-sale software and hardware that enables sellers to turn mobile and computing devices into payment and point-of-sale solutions. It offers hardware products, including Magstripe reader, which enables swiped transactions of magnetic stripe cards; Contactless and chip reader that accepts EMV® chip cards and Near Field Communication payments; Chip card reader, which accepts EMV® chip cards and enables swiped transactions of magnetic stripe cards; Square Stand, which enables an iPad to be used as a payment terminal or full point of sale solution; and Square Register that combines its hardware, point-of-sale software, and payments technology, as well as managed payments solutions.