The Vanguard Group, Inc. recently announced the acquisition of new stake in Novavax Inc. (NASDAQ:NVAX). The institutional investor has increased its shareholding in the Healthcare company by 2.00% to 7.39 million shares with purchase of 0.14 million shares. This fresh investment now brings its stake to 9.44% valued currently at $164.49 million. In addition, BlackRock Fund Advisors raised its holdings by 0.1 million to 3.76 million shares. And SSgA Funds Management, Inc. has lifted its position by 23.21% or 0.69 million shares – to 3.66 million shares.
With over 7.24 million Novavax Inc. (NVAX) shares trading Tuesday and a closing price of $16.83 on the day, the dollar volume was approximately $121.77 million. The shares have shown a negative half year performance of -69.56% and its price on 11/29/22 gained nearly 1.14%. Currently, there are 78.27M common shares owned by the public and among those 78.14M shares have been available to trade.
Will You Miss Out On This Growth Stock Boom?
A new megatrend in the fintech market is well underway. Mobile payments are projected to boom into a massive $12 trillion market by 2028. According to Motley Fool this growth stock could "deliver huge returns." Not only in the immediate future but also over the next decade. Especially since the man behind this company is a serial entrepreneur who has been wildly successful over the years.
And this is just one of our
5 Best Growth Stocks To Own For 2023.
Sponsored
Insiders at the company have transacted a total of 116 times over the past 12 months, according to data filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). 29 of these insider trades were purchases, accounting for 79,215 shares. Insider sales of the common stock occurred on 87 occasions, with total insider shares sold totaling 65,040 shares.
The top 3 mutual fund holders in Novavax Inc. are SPDR S&P Biotech ETF, Vanguard Total Stock Market Index, and Vanguard Small Cap Index Fund. SPDR S&P Biotech ETF owns 2.58 million shares of the company’s stock, all valued at over $57.39 million. The company bought an additional 14260.0 shares recently to bring their total holdings to about 3.30% of the shares outstanding. Vanguard Total Stock Market Index bought 6131.0 shares to see its total holdings expand to 2.36 million shares valued at over $52.54 million and representing 3.02% of the shares outstanding. Vanguard Small Cap Index Fund bought 32437.0 shares to bring its total holdings to over 2.02 million shares at a value of $44.95 million. Vanguard Small Cap Index Fund now owns shares totaling to 2.58% of the shares outstanding.
Shares of Novavax Inc. (NASDAQ: NVAX) opened at $16.97, up $0.33 from a prior closing price of $16.64. However, the script later moved the day high at 18.06, up 1.14%. The company’s stock has a 5-day price change of -11.19% and -52.21% over the past three months. NVAX shares are trading -88.24% year to date (YTD), with the 12-month market performance down to -92.28% lower. It has a 12-month low price of $16.00 and touched a high of $236.50 over the same period. NVAX has an average intraday trading volume of 4.88 million shares. The stock is trading above its simple moving averages at the SMA20, SMA50, and SMA200, as the current price level is off by -16.59%, -17.33%, and -64.59% respectively.
Institutional ownership of Novavax Inc. (NASDAQ: NVAX) shares accounts for 47.00% of the company’s 78.27M shares outstanding. Mutual fund holders own 22.20%, while other institutional holders and individual stakeholders account for 24.44% and 0.30% respectively.
It has a market capitalization of $1.31B and a beta (3y monthly) value of 1.81. The earnings-per-share (ttm) stands at -$17.25. Price movements for the stock have been influenced by the stock’s volatility, which stands at 8.25% over the week and 10.71% over the month.
Analysts forecast that Novavax Inc. (NVAX) will achieve an EPS of $1.58 for the current quarter, $1.49 for the next quarter and -$3.86 for 2023. The lowest estimate earnings-per-share for the quarter is -$0.81 while analysts give the company a high EPS estimate of $3.76. Comparatively, EPS for the current quarter was -$4.31 a year ago. Earnings per share for the fiscal year are expected to decrease by -222.50%, and 26.40% over the next financial year. EPS should grow at an annualized rate of 58.20% over the next five years, compared to -2.50% over the past 5-year period.
If you are looking to buy this stock, then you may note that the average analyst recommendation by 6 brokerage firm advisors rate Novavax Inc. (NVAX) as a “Moderate Buy” at a consensus score of 2.60. Specifically, 3 Wall Street analysts polled rate the stock as a buy, while 1 of the 6 advise that investors “hold,” and 1 rated it as a “Sell.”
Looking at the support for the NVAX, a number of firms have released research notes about the stock. JP Morgan stated their Underweight rating for the stock in a research note on September 22, 2022, with the firm’s price target at $132-$27. BofA Securities coverage for the Novavax Inc. (NVAX) stock in a research note released on May 20, 2022 offered a Underperform rating with a price target of $35. B. Riley Securities was of a view on February 23, 2022 that the stock is Buy, while Jefferies gave the stock Buy rating on February 22, 2022, issuing a price target of $198. Cowen on their part issued Outperform rating on January 21, 2022.
