Itron Inc. (NASDAQ: ITRI): Analyst View Points To Future Growth

The Vanguard Group, Inc. has recently announced that it has increased stake in Itron Inc. (NASDAQ:ITRI) by 2.16%. After grabbing 5.0 million shares, the institutional investor is now in possession of 0.11 million shares of the Technology Company. The new investment brought the stake of investor firm to 11.08% having worth around $253.41 million. Moreover, SSgA Funds Management, Inc. increased its share by 9432.0 to have a control over 1.68 million shares. And Schroder Investment Management Lt raised its holdings to 85646.0 shares by acquiring 1.4 million shares or 3.09% of the stake.

Itron Inc. (ITRI) concluded trading on 01/18/23 at a closing price of $56.70, with 0.21 million shares of worth about $11.89 million changed hands on the day. Half year performance of the stock remained positive as price took a surge of 16.05% during that period and on Wednesday the price saw a loss of about -1.94%. Currently the company’s common shares owned by public are about 45.14M shares, out of which, 44.83M 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: 11 analysts are covering the ITRI stock and their offered price forecasts bring an average price target of $52.78. Over the next 12 months, analysts forecasted that the stock’s price could jump as high as $65.00 and could fall to a lowest price of $40.00. The stock’s current price level is -8.0% below of average price target set by the analysts, while a dip to estimated low would result in loss of -41.75% for the stock. However, touching the estimated high of $65.00 would mean a gain of 12.77% 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 56 times over the past 12 months. They bought 106,183 shares in 35 of the transactions. In 21 selling transactions, insiders dumped 29,454 shares.

iShares Core S&P Small Cap ETF, Vanguard Total Stock Market Index, and Vanguard Small Cap Index Fund are the top 3 mutual funds which are holding stakes in Itron Inc. iShares Core S&P Small Cap ETF is currently holding 3.34 million shares of worth totaling $169.29 million. The company recently came selling 2240.0 shares which brought its stake up to 7.40% of the company’s outstanding shares. Vanguard Total Stock Market Index bought 2368.0 shares, after which its hold over company’s outstanding shares expand to 3.04%, leaving 1.38 million shares with the mutual fund that have a worth of about $69.66 million. Vanguard Small Cap Index Fund, after buying 1.17 million shares, have now control over 2.58% of the stake in the company. It holds 2996.0 shares of worth $59.07 million.

Itron Inc. (NASDAQ: ITRI) started trading at $57.97, above $0.15 from concluding price of the previous day. However, the stock later moved at a day high price of 58.51, or with a loss of -1.94%. Stock saw a price change of 2.03% in past 5 days and over the past one month there was a price change of 10.31%. Year-to-date (YTD), ITRI shares are showing a performance of 11.94% which decreased to -10.16% when we look at its performance for past 12 months. Over the period of past 52 weeks, stock dropped to lowest price of $39.38 but also hit the highest price of $62.77 during that period. The average intraday trading volume for Itron Inc. shares is 295.39K. The stock is currently trading 7.63% above its 20-day simple moving average (SMA20), while that difference is up 8.06% for SMA50 and it goes to 13.66% higher than SMA200.

The Vanguard Group, Inc. acquired 5.0 million shares of Itron Inc. having value of about $253.41 million. Data submitted at the U.S SEC by The Vanguard Group, Inc. revealed that the firm now holds 0.11 million shares in the company valued at close to $6003055.8, or have control over 2.16% stake in the company. Holding of mutual funds in the company is about 30.92% while other institutional holders and individual stake holders have control over 72.69% and 13.67% of the stake respectively.

The stock has a current market capitalization of $2.53B and its 3Y-monthly beta is at 1.32. It has posted earnings per share of -$2.01 in the same period. It has Quick Ratio of 1.20 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 ITRI, volatility over the week remained 2.59% while standing at 3.11% over the month.

Analysts are in expectations that Itron Inc. (ITRI) stock would likely to be making an EPS of $0.22 in the current quarter, while forecast for next quarter EPS is $0.34 and it is $2.23 for next year. For the current quarter EPS, analysts have given the company a lowest target $0.09 which is $0.29 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 $0.21 in the same quarter a year ago. Stock’s fiscal year EPS is expected to drop by -27.40% while it is estimated to increase by 199.60% in next year. EPS is likely to grow at an annualized rate of 25.00% for next 5-years, compared to annual growth of -33.40% made by the stock over the past 5-years.

Analysts at 11 brokerage firms have issued recommendations for the Itron Inc. (ITRI)’s stock and average of those rates the stock at a “Moderate Buy” and assign it a score of 2.60. Out of those 11 Wall Street analysts, 3 recommended a “Buy” rating, while 8 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 JP Morgan on August 08, 2022 offering a Neutral rating for the stock and assigned a target price of $65 to it. Coverage by Stephens stated Itron Inc. (ITRI) stock as an Equal-weight in their note to investors on August 05, 2022, suggesting a price target of $55 for the stock. Stock get a Neutral rating from Piper Sandler on November 08, 2021.