The Vanguard Group, Inc. recently announced the acquisition of new stake in Calavo Growers Inc. (NASDAQ:CVGW). The institutional investor has increased its shareholding in the Consumer Defensive company by 2.37% to 1.39 million shares with purchase of 32227.0 shares. This fresh investment now brings its stake to 7.87% valued currently at $41.01 million. In addition, ClearBridge Investments LLC raised its holdings by 2661.0 to 0.62 million shares. And Kennedy Capital Management, Inc. has lifted its position by 2.50% or 11241.0 shares – to 0.46 million shares.
With over 0.13 million Calavo Growers Inc. (CVGW) shares trading Friday and a closing price of $31.95 on the day, the dollar volume was approximately $4.15 million. The shares have shown a negative half year performance of -26.16% and its price on 01/13/23 gained nearly 2.37%. Currently, there are 17.67M common shares owned by the public and among those 17.05M shares have been available to trade.
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An analysis of what Wall Street brokers have to say about the expected price targets for this stock gives us this picture: 5 analysts who have offered their price forecasts for CVGW have a consensus price objective of $42.25. The analysts have set the share’s price value over the next 12 months at a high of $50.00 and a low of $39.00. The average price target is 24.38% above its recent price level and an upside to the estimated low will see the stock gain 18.08% over that period. But an upside of 36.1% will see the stock hit the forecast high price target while median target price for the stock is $40.00.
Insiders at the company have transacted a total of 20 times over the past 12 months, according to data filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). 16 of these insider trades were purchases, accounting for 73,774 shares. Insider sales of the common stock occurred on 4 occasions, with total insider shares sold totaling 4,075 shares.
The top 3 mutual fund holders in Calavo Growers Inc. are iShares Core S&P Small Cap ETF, Nuance Mid Cap Value Fund, and ClearBridge Small Cap Growth Fund. iShares Core S&P Small Cap ETF owns 1.32 million shares of the company’s stock, all valued at over $38.82 million. The company sold 4816.0 shares recently to bring their total holdings to about 7.45% of the shares outstanding. ClearBridge Small Cap Growth Fund sold 8699.0 shares to bring its total holdings to over 0.51 million shares at a value of $15.13 million. ClearBridge Small Cap Growth Fund now owns shares totaling to 2.90% of the shares outstanding.
However, the script later moved the day high at 32.11, up 2.37%. The company’s stock has a 5-day price change of 1.62% and -0.75% over the past three months. CVGW shares are trading 8.67% year to date (YTD), with the 12-month market performance down to -24.58% lower. It has a 12-month low price of $27.29 and touched a high of $45.50 over the same period. CVGW has an average intraday trading volume of 112.78K shares. The stock is trading above its simple moving averages at the SMA20, SMA50, and SMA200, as the current price level is off by 2.22%, -5.29%, and -12.32% respectively.
Institutional ownership of Calavo Growers Inc. (NASDAQ: CVGW) shares accounts for 76.80% of the company’s 17.67M shares outstanding. Mutual fund holders own 27.10%, while other institutional holders and individual stakeholders account for 48.93% and 14.22% respectively.
It has a market capitalization of $553.37M and a beta (3y monthly) value of 0.67. The earnings-per-share (ttm) stands at -$0.35. Price movements for the stock have been influenced by the stock’s volatility, which stands at 3.19% over the week and 3.93% over the month.
Analysts forecast that Calavo Growers Inc. (CVGW) will achieve an EPS of $0.31 for the current quarter, $0.25 for the next quarter and $1.89 for 2023. The lowest estimate earnings-per-share for the quarter is $0.22 while analysts give the company a high EPS estimate of $0.39. Comparatively, EPS for the current quarter was -$0.08 a year ago. Earnings per share for the fiscal year are expected to increase by 47.20%, and 37.49% over the next financial year. EPS should grow at an annualized rate of 14.30% over the next five years, compared to -16.70% over the past 5-year period.
If you are looking to buy this stock, then you may note that the average analyst recommendation by 5 brokerage firm advisors rate Calavo Growers Inc. (CVGW) as a “Moderate Buy” at a consensus score of 2.60. Specifically, 2 Wall Street analysts polled rate the stock as a buy, while 3 of the 5 advise that investors “hold,” and 0 rated it as a “Sell.”
Looking at the support for the CVGW, a number of firms have released research notes about the stock. Lake Street stated their Buy rating for the stock in a research note on June 04, 2021, with the firm’s price target at $85. DA Davidson coverage for the Calavo Growers Inc. (CVGW) stock in a research note released on March 05, 2021 offered a Neutral rating with a price target of $84. Seaport Global Securities was of a view on February 19, 2021 that the stock is Neutral, while National Securities gave the stock Buy rating on October 29, 2020, issuing a price target of $85. Stephens on their part issued Equal-Weight rating on March 02, 2020.
