The Vanguard Group, Inc. recently announced the acquisition of new stake in Methode Electronics Inc. (NYSE:MEI). The institutional investor has increased its shareholding in the Technology company by 2.26% to 4.05 million shares with purchase of 89506.0 shares. This fresh investment now brings its stake to 11.21% valued currently at $179.55 million. In addition, Massachusetts Financial Services raised its holdings by 93727.0 to 2.33 million shares. And Dimensional Fund Advisors LP has lifted its position by 5.69% or 0.12 million shares – to 2.17 million shares.
With over 76903.0 Methode Electronics Inc. (MEI) shares trading Tuesday and a closing price of $46.33 on the day, the dollar volume was approximately $3.56 million. The shares have shown a positive half year performance of 20.12% and its price on 01/24/23 gained nearly 1.00%. Currently, there are 36.13M common shares owned by the public and among those 34.47M 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: 4 analysts who have offered their price forecasts for MEI have a consensus price objective of $54.50. The analysts have set the share’s price value over the next 12 months at a high of $59.00 and a low of $50.00. The average price target is 14.99% above its recent price level and an upside to the estimated low will see the stock gain 7.34% over that period. But an upside of 21.47% will see the stock hit the forecast high price target while median target price for the stock is $54.50.
Insiders at the company have transacted a total of 53 times over the past 12 months, according to data filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). 43 of these insider trades were purchases, accounting for 110,753 shares. Insider sales of the common stock occurred on 10 occasions, with total insider shares sold totaling 77,507 shares.
The top 3 mutual fund holders in Methode Electronics Inc. are iShares Core S&P Small Cap ETF, MFS New Discovery Value Fund, and Vanguard Total Stock Market Index. iShares Core S&P Small Cap ETF owns 2.71 million shares of the company’s stock, all valued at over $120.05 million. The company sold 1920.0 shares recently to bring their total holdings to about 7.50% of the shares outstanding. MFS New Discovery Value Fund sold 13340.0 shares to see its total holdings shrink to 1.11 million shares valued at over $49.23 million and representing 3.08% of the shares outstanding. Vanguard Total Stock Market Index bought 2669.0 shares to bring its total holdings to over 1.06 million shares at a value of $47.09 million. Vanguard Total Stock Market Index now owns shares totaling to 2.94% of the shares outstanding.
Shares of Methode Electronics Inc. (NYSE: MEI) opened at $45.55, down -$0.32 from a prior closing price of $45.87. However, the script later moved the day high at 46.41, up 1.00%. The company’s stock has a 5-day price change of -0.64% and 20.15% over the past three months. MEI shares are trading 4.42% year to date (YTD), with the 12-month market performance up to 3.09% higher. It has a 12-month low price of $33.91 and touched a high of $50.39 over the same period. MEI has an average intraday trading volume of 133.50K shares. The stock is trading above its simple moving averages at the SMA20, SMA50, and SMA200, as the current price level is off by 1.70%, 1.43%, and 10.50% respectively.
Institutional ownership of Methode Electronics Inc. (NYSE: MEI) shares accounts for 99.98% of the company’s 36.13M shares outstanding. Mutual fund holders own 33.56%, while other institutional holders and individual stakeholders account for 64.48% and 11.93% respectively.
It has a market capitalization of $1.66B and a beta (3y monthly) value of 1.13. The stock’s trailing 12-month PE ratio is 18.20, while the earnings-per-share (ttm) stands at $2.55. The company has a PEG of 1.21 and a Quick Ratio of 2.30 with the debt-to-equity ratio at 0.23. Price movements for the stock have been influenced by the stock’s volatility, which stands at 2.13% over the week and 2.22% over the month.
Analysts forecast that Methode Electronics Inc. (MEI) will achieve an EPS of $0.64 for the current quarter, $0.75 for the next quarter and $3.44 for 2024. The lowest estimate earnings-per-share for the quarter is $0.6 while analysts give the company a high EPS estimate of $0.66. Comparatively, EPS for the current quarter was $0.72 a year ago. Earnings per share for the fiscal year are expected to decrease by -15.40%, and 22.11% over the next financial year. EPS should grow at an annualized rate of 15.00% over the next five years, compared to 1.70% over the past 5-year period.
If you are looking to buy this stock, then you may note that the average analyst recommendation by 4 brokerage firm advisors rate Methode Electronics Inc. (MEI) as a “Moderate Buy” at a consensus score of 2.00. Specifically, 2 Wall Street analysts polled rate the stock as a buy, while 2 of the 4 advise that investors “hold,” and 0 rated it as a “Sell.”
Looking at the support for the MEI, a number of firms have released research notes about the stock. Jefferies stated their Buy rating for the stock in a research note on November 22, 2022, with the firm’s price target at $52. Robert W. Baird was of a view on October 20, 2020 that the stock is Neutral, while B. Riley FBR gave the stock Neutral rating on March 19, 2020, issuing a price target of $42- $24. Craig Hallum on their part issued Buy rating on March 08, 2019.
