Vertiv Sees Unusually Large Options Volume (NYSE:VRT)

Vertiv Holdings Co (NYSE:VRT) was the target of some unusual options trading on Wednesday. Stock traders bought 35,466 call options on the company. This is an increase of approximately 47% compared to the average volume of 24,068 call options.

Insider Activity at Vertiv

In other news, CAO Scott Cripps sold 56,594 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, March 8th. The stock was sold at an average price of $70.76, for a total transaction of $4,004,591.44. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available through the SEC website. In other news, EVP Stephen Liang sold 306,196 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, March 1st. The stock was sold at an average price of $70.24, for a total transaction of $21,507,207.04. Following the transaction, the executive vice president now directly owns 51,841 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $3,641,311.84. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this link. Also, CAO Scott Cripps sold 56,594 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, March 8th. The shares were sold at an average price of $70.76, for a total value of $4,004,591.44. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. 5.62% of the stock is owned by insiders.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On Vertiv

Large investors have recently made changes to their positions in the business. Nordea Investment Management AB bought a new stake in shares of Vertiv during the fourth quarter valued at approximately $1,040,000. WT Asset Management Ltd bought a new stake in shares of Vertiv during the fourth quarter valued at approximately $24,486,000. CenterBook Partners LP increased its position in shares of Vertiv by 82.0% during the third quarter. CenterBook Partners LP now owns 174,938 shares of the company’s stock valued at $6,508,000 after acquiring an additional 78,793 shares in the last quarter. Quadrature Capital Ltd increased its position in shares of Vertiv by 791.6% during the third quarter. Quadrature Capital Ltd now owns 92,628 shares of the company’s stock valued at $3,445,000 after acquiring an additional 82,239 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Assenagon Asset Management S.A. increased its position in shares of Vertiv by 244.7% during the fourth quarter. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. now owns 41,984 shares of the company’s stock valued at $2,016,000 after acquiring an additional 29,804 shares in the last quarter. 89.92% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Vertiv Stock Performance

Shares of VRT opened at $90.35 on Friday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.45, a current ratio of 1.74 and a quick ratio of 1.35. Vertiv has a one year low of $13.06 and a one year high of $94.39. The company has a 50-day simple moving average of $75.90 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $57.10. The firm has a market capitalization of $34.51 billion, a PE ratio of 76.57, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.26 and a beta of 1.59.

Vertiv (NYSE:VRT) last released its earnings results on Wednesday, April 24th. The company reported $0.43 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.37 by $0.06. Vertiv had a net margin of 6.71% and a return on equity of 39.46%. The firm had revenue of $1.64 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.62 billion. During the same period last year, the business earned $0.24 earnings per share. The business’s revenue was up 7.8% on a year-over-year basis. On average, analysts anticipate that Vertiv will post 2.36 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Vertiv Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Thursday, March 28th. Stockholders of record on Tuesday, March 19th were issued a dividend of $0.025 per share. The ex-dividend date was Monday, March 18th. This represents a $0.10 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.11%. Vertiv’s payout ratio is 8.47%.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of brokerages have recently issued reports on VRT. Mizuho raised their price objective on Vertiv from $50.00 to $56.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Thursday, February 22nd. JPMorgan Chase & Co. raised their target price on Vertiv from $95.00 to $100.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Thursday. Oppenheimer raised their target price on Vertiv from $96.00 to $98.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research note on Thursday. Evercore ISI raised their target price on Vertiv from $90.00 to $95.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research note on Thursday. Finally, Citigroup raised their target price on Vertiv from $102.00 to $110.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Thursday. One analyst has rated the stock with a hold rating and nine have issued a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $76.78.

Vertiv Company Profile

Vertiv Holdings Co, together with its subsidiaries, designs, manufactures, and services critical digital infrastructure technologies and life cycle services for data centers, communication networks, and commercial and industrial environments in the Americas, the Asia Pacific, Europe, the Middle East, and Africa.