There Is Clear Momentum For Verrica Pharmaceuticals Inc. (NASDAQ: VRCA)

Fidelity Management & Research Co has recently announced that it has increased stake in Verrica Pharmaceuticals Inc. (NASDAQ:VRCA) by 0.01%. After grabbing 1.6 million shares, the institutional investor is now in possession of 80.0 shares of the Healthcare Company. The new investment brought the stake of investor firm to 3.89% having worth around $5.19 million. Moreover, BlackRock Fund Advisors increased its share by 67215.0 to have a control over 0.26 million shares. And Renaissance Technologies LLC raised its holdings to 0.18 million shares by acquiring 0.23 million shares or 0.56% of the stake.

Verrica Pharmaceuticals Inc. (VRCA) concluded trading on 01/11/23 at a closing price of $4.76, with 0.41 million shares of worth about $1.93 million changed hands on the day. Half year performance of the stock remained positive as price took a surge of 41.25% during that period and on Wednesday the price saw a gain of about 10.19%. Currently the company’s common shares owned by public are about 40.30M shares, out of which, 19.33M shares are available for trading.

A deeper look into what the analysts at Wall Street are thinking about the price target of this stock provides us with the following: 5 analysts are covering the VRCA stock and their offered price forecasts bring an average price target of $10.00. Over the next 12 months, analysts forecasted that the stock’s price could jump as high as $15.00 and could fall to a lowest price of $4.00. The stock’s current price level is 58.97% above of average price target set by the analysts, while a rise to estimated low would result in loss of -19.0% for the stock. However, touching the estimated high of $15.00 would mean a gain of 68.27% for the stock.

According to filings with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), insiders took part in trade of the company’s stock for 7 times over the past 12 months. They bought 6,489,402 shares in 7 of the transactions. In 0 selling transactions, insiders dumped 0 shares.

Fidelity Select Port. – Biotechno, Vanguard Total Stock Market Index, and iShares Biotechnology ETF are the top 3 mutual funds which are holding stakes in Verrica Pharmaceuticals Inc. Fidelity Select Port. – Biotechno is currently holding 1.6 million shares of worth totaling $5.19 million. The company recently came buying 0.0 shares which brought its stake up to 3.89% of the company’s outstanding shares. iShares Biotechnology ETF, after buying 0.19 million shares, have now control over 0.46% of the stake in the company. It holds 1001.0 shares of worth $0.62 million.

Verrica Pharmaceuticals Inc. (NASDAQ: VRCA) started trading at $4.35, above $0.03 from concluding price of the previous day. However, the stock later moved at a day high price of 4.7700, or with a gain of 10.19%. Stock saw a price change of 43.81% in past 5 days and over the past one month there was a price change of 54.05%. Year-to-date (YTD), VRCA shares are showing a performance of 73.09% which decreased to -47.40% when we look at its performance for past 12 months. Over the period of past 52 weeks, stock dropped to lowest price of $1.77 but also hit the highest price of $9.34 during that period. The average intraday trading volume for Verrica Pharmaceuticals Inc. shares is 93.29K. The stock is currently trading 56.48% above its 20-day simple moving average (SMA20), while that difference is up 69.78% for SMA50 and it goes to 24.83% higher than SMA200.

Fidelity Management & Research Co acquired 1.6 million shares of Verrica Pharmaceuticals Inc. having value of about $5.19 million. Data submitted at the U.S SEC by Fidelity Management & Research Co revealed that the firm now holds 80.0 shares in the company valued at close to $380.8, or have control over 0.01% stake in the company. Verrica Pharmaceuticals Inc. (NASDAQ: VRCA) currently have 40.30M outstanding shares and institutions hold larger chunk of about 25.10% of that. Holding of mutual funds in the company is about 58.05% while other institutional holders and individual stake holders have control over 7.93% and 16.34% of the stake respectively.

The stock has a current market capitalization of $178.98M and its 3Y-monthly beta is at 1.97. It has posted earnings per share of -$1.02 in the same period. It has Quick Ratio of 14.10 while making debt-to-equity ratio of 0.00. Volatility of a stock is a metric used to know how much the price of that stock is under influence and for VRCA, volatility over the week remained 10.60% while standing at 8.95% over the month.

Analysts are in expectations that Verrica Pharmaceuticals Inc. (VRCA) stock would likely to be making an EPS of -$0.11 in the current quarter, while forecast for next quarter EPS is -$0.22 and it is -$1.1 for next year. For the current quarter EPS, analysts have given the company a lowest target -$0.25 which is $0.02 at the higher side of the target for the same. When we compare those targets with actual EPS, we find that company posted an EPS of -$0.47 in the same quarter a year ago. Stock’s fiscal year EPS is expected to rise by 24.10% while it is estimated to decrease by -12.30% in next year.

Analysts at 5 brokerage firms have issued recommendations for the Verrica Pharmaceuticals Inc. (VRCA)’s stock and average of those rates the stock at a “Moderate Buy” and assign it a score of 2.40. Out of those 5 Wall Street analysts, 3 recommended a “Buy” rating, while 2 were in favor recommending the stock as a “Hold” and 0 analyst recommended the stock as “Sell”.

Digging deeper we find that several firms have released their research notes about the support levels of the stock. Most recent of them is a note released by RBC Capital Mkts on May 25, 2022 offering a Sector perform rating for the stock and assigned a target price range of between $16 and $4 to it. Coverage by RBC Capital Mkts stated Verrica Pharmaceuticals Inc. (VRCA) stock as an Outperform in their note to investors on May 14, 2021, suggesting a price target of $19 for the stock. Stock get a Buy rating from H.C. Wainwright on June 30, 2020.