Eastern Bank Buys New Position in Viking Holdings Ltd. $VIK

Eastern Bank acquired a new position in Viking Holdings Ltd. (NYSE:VIK) in the 2nd quarter, HoldingsChannel.com reports. The firm acquired 100,631 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $10,533,000.

Several other hedge funds also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the business. Invesco Ltd. grew its stake in shares of Viking by 4.1% during the 4th quarter. Invesco Ltd. now owns 14,619,029 shares of the company’s stock worth $1,043,945,000 after purchasing an additional 570,672 shares during the period. Federated Hermes Inc. raised its holdings in shares of Viking by 1.6% during the fourth quarter. Federated Hermes Inc. now owns 8,611,685 shares of the company’s stock valued at $614,960,000 after acquiring an additional 136,918 shares during the last quarter. Norges Bank acquired a new stake in shares of Viking in the fourth quarter valued at about $372,297,000. AQR Capital Management LLC raised its holdings in Viking by 316.8% in the 4th quarter. AQR Capital Management LLC now owns 4,426,297 shares of the company’s stock valued at $316,082,000 after acquiring an additional 3,364,265 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Two Sigma Investments LP increased its holdings in shares of Viking by 28.8% in the third quarter. Two Sigma Investments LP now owns 2,690,678 shares of the company’s stock valued at $167,253,000 after purchasing an additional 600,890 shares during the last quarter. 98.84% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of equities research analysts have recently issued reports on the stock. Barclays boosted their price target on shares of Viking from $88.00 to $93.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Wednesday, July 8th. Wells Fargo & Company upgraded Viking from an “equal weight” rating to an “overweight” rating and lifted their target price for the stock from $79.00 to $109.00 in a research report on Monday, May 18th. Stifel Nicolaus set a $105.00 price objective on Viking in a research note on Friday, May 15th. Mizuho raised their price target on Viking from $69.00 to $75.00 and gave the company an “underperform” rating in a report on Friday, May 15th. Finally, Sanford C. Bernstein initiated coverage on Viking in a research report on Wednesday, June 3rd. They set an “outperform” rating and a $120.00 target price on the stock. One analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, fourteen have assigned a Buy rating, three have issued a Hold rating and one has issued a Sell rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, Viking has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $104.06.

Viking Stock Up 1.8%

NYSE:VIK opened at $106.28 on Tuesday. The company has a market capitalization of $47.37 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 39.51, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.20 and a beta of 1.50. Viking Holdings Ltd. has a one year low of $55.55 and a one year high of $107.06. The stock has a 50-day simple moving average of $97.60 and a 200 day simple moving average of $83.76. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 5.27, a quick ratio of 0.76 and a current ratio of 0.78.

Viking (NYSE:VIK) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, May 14th. The company reported ($0.11) earnings per share for the quarter, meeting the consensus estimate of ($0.11). Viking had a net margin of 18.00% and a return on equity of 149.40%. The firm had revenue of $1.05 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $1.01 billion. During the same period last year, the firm posted ($0.24) EPS. Viking’s quarterly revenue was up 17.5% compared to the same quarter last year. Sell-side analysts predict that Viking Holdings Ltd. will post 3.32 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, EVP Richard Marnell sold 11,287 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, June 12th. The shares were sold at an average price of $92.85, for a total transaction of $1,047,997.95. Following the sale, the executive vice president owned 117,050 shares in the company, valued at $10,868,092.50. The trade was a 8.79% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through the SEC website. Over the last 90 days, insiders sold 17,566 shares of company stock valued at $1,640,166.

Viking Company Profile

Viking Holdings Ltd engages in the passenger shipping and other forms of passenger transport in North America, the United Kingdom, and internationally. It operates through River and Ocean segments. The company also operates as a tour entrepreneur for passengers and related activities in tourism. As of December 31, 2023, it operated a fleet of 92 ships, including 81 river vessels comprising 58 Longships, 10 smaller classes based on the Longship design, 11 other river vessels, and 1 river vessel charter and the Viking Mississippi; 9 ocean ships; and 2 expedition ships.