Gabelli Funds LLC Buys 70,000 Shares of EchoStar Corporation $SATS

Gabelli Funds LLC increased its stake in EchoStar Corporation (NASDAQ:SATS) by 24.2% in the 2nd quarter, HoldingsChannel reports. The institutional investor owned 359,805 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock after purchasing an additional 70,000 shares during the quarter. Gabelli Funds LLC’s holdings in EchoStar were worth $9,967,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Several other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also made changes to their positions in SATS. Geode Capital Management LLC raised its position in EchoStar by 11.5% during the second quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 3,449,193 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock worth $95,553,000 after acquiring an additional 355,009 shares in the last quarter. Northern Trust Corp raised its holdings in shares of EchoStar by 25.3% in the 1st quarter. Northern Trust Corp now owns 1,699,986 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock valued at $43,486,000 after purchasing an additional 343,590 shares during the period. Bank of New York Mellon Corp lifted its stake in EchoStar by 32.8% in the 2nd quarter. Bank of New York Mellon Corp now owns 1,268,572 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock valued at $35,139,000 after purchasing an additional 313,314 shares during the last quarter. Invesco Ltd. grew its holdings in EchoStar by 30.1% during the second quarter. Invesco Ltd. now owns 913,292 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock worth $25,298,000 after purchasing an additional 211,421 shares during the period. Finally, Rhumbline Advisers increased its position in EchoStar by 12.9% during the second quarter. Rhumbline Advisers now owns 442,494 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock worth $12,257,000 after buying an additional 50,509 shares during the last quarter. 33.62% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

SATS has been the subject of a number of recent analyst reports. Morgan Stanley raised their price objective on EchoStar from $59.00 to $91.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research report on Tuesday, September 9th. Zacks Research downgraded EchoStar from a “strong-buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a report on Tuesday, November 11th. Citigroup upped their price objective on shares of EchoStar from $85.00 to $87.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a report on Tuesday, November 11th. Cowen restated a “buy” rating on shares of EchoStar in a research note on Wednesday, August 27th. Finally, Weiss Ratings reaffirmed a “sell (d-)” rating on shares of EchoStar in a report on Wednesday, October 8th. Three research analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating, four have assigned a Hold rating and one has assigned a Sell rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, EchoStar currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $75.60.

EchoStar Price Performance

SATS opened at $88.26 on Tuesday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 3.11, a current ratio of 0.61 and a quick ratio of 0.56. The stock’s 50 day simple moving average is $73.60 and its 200 day simple moving average is $50.45. The firm has a market cap of $25.41 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of -1.97 and a beta of 1.03. EchoStar Corporation has a 1 year low of $14.90 and a 1 year high of $90.40.

EchoStar (NASDAQ:SATS) last released its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, November 6th. The communications equipment provider reported ($44.37) earnings per share for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of ($1.23) by ($43.14). EchoStar had a negative net margin of 85.36% and a positive return on equity of 0.39%. The company had revenue of $3.61 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $3.75 billion. During the same period last year, the company posted ($0.52) EPS. The business’s revenue for the quarter was down 7.1% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, analysts predict that EchoStar Corporation will post -1.99 earnings per share for the current year.

Insider Buying and Selling at EchoStar

In other news, CEO Hamid Akhavan sold 233,918 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, September 12th. The shares were sold at an average price of $75.35, for a total transaction of $17,625,721.30. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer directly owned 376,805 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $28,392,256.75. This represents a 38.30% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is accessible through this hyperlink. Also, COO Paul Gaske sold 750 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, September 12th. The stock was sold at an average price of $78.32, for a total value of $58,740.00. Additional details regarding this sale are available in the official SEC disclosure. Insiders sold 266,151 shares of company stock valued at $19,885,417 in the last quarter. Company insiders own 55.70% of the company’s stock.

About EchoStar

EchoStar Corporation, together with its subsidiaries, provides networking technologies and services worldwide. The company operates in four segments: Pay-TV, Retail Wireless, 5G Network Deployment, Broadband and Satellite Services. The Pay-TV segment offers a direct broadcast and fixed satellite services; designs, develops, and distributes receiver system; and provides digital broadcast operations, including satellite uplinking/downlinking, transmission and, other services to third-party pay-TV providers; and multichannel, live-linear and on-demand streaming over-the-top internet-based domestic, international, Latino, and Freestream video programming services under the DISH and SLING brand names.