Equinor ASA (NYSE:EQNR) Short Interest Update

Equinor ASA (NYSE:EQNR) was the target of a significant growth in short interest during the month of December. As of December 31st, there was short interest totalling 15,270,000 shares, a growth of 7.5% from the December 15th total of 14,200,000 shares. Based on an average daily volume of 3,540,000 shares, the days-to-cover ratio is currently 4.3 days. Approximately 0.6% of the company’s stock are short sold.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

A number of institutional investors and hedge funds have recently added to or reduced their stakes in EQNR. American Century Companies Inc. lifted its position in Equinor ASA by 6.8% during the second quarter. American Century Companies Inc. now owns 230,252 shares of the company’s stock valued at $6,576,000 after purchasing an additional 14,705 shares during the period. Envestnet Asset Management Inc. lifted its position in Equinor ASA by 13.3% during the second quarter. Envestnet Asset Management Inc. now owns 416,585 shares of the company’s stock valued at $11,898,000 after purchasing an additional 49,029 shares during the period. Vanguard Personalized Indexing Management LLC lifted its position in Equinor ASA by 21.0% during the second quarter. Vanguard Personalized Indexing Management LLC now owns 32,709 shares of the company’s stock valued at $913,000 after purchasing an additional 5,680 shares during the period. Profund Advisors LLC lifted its position in Equinor ASA by 3.0% during the second quarter. Profund Advisors LLC now owns 19,260 shares of the company’s stock valued at $550,000 after purchasing an additional 559 shares during the period. Finally, EverSource Wealth Advisors LLC lifted its position in Equinor ASA by 27.1% during the second quarter. EverSource Wealth Advisors LLC now owns 1,712 shares of the company’s stock valued at $45,000 after purchasing an additional 365 shares during the period. 5.51% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several research firms have issued reports on EQNR. Redburn Atlantic raised shares of Equinor ASA from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating in a report on Wednesday, November 20th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. raised shares of Equinor ASA from an “underweight” rating to an “overweight” rating in a report on Monday, December 9th. Citigroup raised shares of Equinor ASA to a “strong sell” rating in a report on Wednesday, October 2nd. Morgan Stanley raised shares of Equinor ASA from an “equal weight” rating to an “overweight” rating and lifted their price target for the stock from $25.80 to $30.90 in a report on Tuesday, January 7th. Finally, Berenberg Bank raised shares of Equinor ASA from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a report on Wednesday, November 27th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, three have assigned a hold rating, five have assigned a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the company has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $29.45.

Equinor ASA Price Performance

Shares of EQNR opened at $24.94 on Tuesday. The firm has a market capitalization of $69.65 billion, a PE ratio of 7.65, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.31 and a beta of 0.84. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.51, a current ratio of 1.48 and a quick ratio of 1.38. Equinor ASA has a 1-year low of $21.85 and a 1-year high of $29.49. The company’s fifty day moving average price is $23.93 and its 200-day moving average price is $25.16.

Equinor ASA (NYSE:EQNR) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, October 24th. The company reported $0.79 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.74 by $0.05. The firm had revenue of $25.45 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $24.45 billion. Equinor ASA had a net margin of 8.95% and a return on equity of 19.97%. During the same period in the previous year, the company earned $0.92 earnings per share. On average, equities research analysts predict that Equinor ASA will post 3.36 EPS for the current year.

About Equinor ASA

Equinor ASA, an energy company, engages in the exploration, production, transportation, refining, and marketing of petroleum and other forms of energy in Norway and internationally. It operates through Exploration & Production Norway; Exploration & Production International; Exploration & Production USA; Marketing, Midstream & Processing; Renewables; and Other segments.