The Vanguard Group, Inc. has recently announced that it has increased stake in Freshpet Inc. (NASDAQ:FRPT) by 2.23%. After grabbing 4.36 million shares, the institutional investor is now in possession of 94864.0 shares of the Consumer Defensive Company. The new investment brought the stake of investor firm to 9.07% having worth around $270.97 million. Moreover, Wellington Management Co. LLP increased its share by 0.63 million to have a control over 2.44 million shares. And Fidelity Management & Research Co raised its holdings to 40798.0 shares by acquiring 1.99 million shares or 4.14% of the stake.
Freshpet Inc. (FRPT) concluded trading on 03/16/23 at a closing price of $58.27, with 3.55 million shares of worth about $206.93 million changed hands on the day. Half year performance of the stock remained positive as price took a surge of 40.07% during that period and on Thursday the price saw a gain of about 6.62%. Currently the company’s common shares owned by public are about 48.13M shares, out of which, 46.42M shares are available for trading.
Do You Know The Best Place To Find Gains In Volatile Markets?
In today's chaotic marketplace, the biggest gains will come from some currently-small companies that pass by older, larger businesses still stuck in a pre-pandemic world. The trick is figuring out which small caps will be tomorrow's winners. That's why StockWire News has put together a special Wealth Building Report, highlighting 3 small cap stocks set to soar in 2023.
Click here for full details and to join for free.
Sponsored
A deeper look into what the analysts at Wall Street are thinking about the price target of this stock provides us with the following: 16 analysts are covering the FRPT stock and their offered price forecasts bring an average price target of $75.60. Over the next 12 months, analysts forecasted that the stock’s price could jump as high as $100.00 and could fall to a lowest price of $55.00. The stock’s current price level is 21.46% above of average price target set by the analysts, while a rise to estimated low would result in loss of -5.95% for the stock. However, touching the estimated high of $100.00 would mean a gain of 41.73% 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 6 times over the past 12 months. They bought 33,381 shares in 3 of the transactions. In 3 selling transactions, insiders dumped 8,585 shares.
Vanguard Total Stock Market Index, Champlain Mid Cap Fund, and Vanguard Small Cap Index Fund are the top 3 mutual funds which are holding stakes in Freshpet Inc. Vanguard Total Stock Market Index is currently holding 1.4 million shares of worth totaling $87.16 million. The company recently came buying 14185.0 shares which brought its stake up to 2.92% of the company’s outstanding shares. Champlain Mid Cap Fund sold 20000.0 shares, after which its hold over company’s outstanding shares shrunk to 2.92%, leaving 1.4 million shares with the mutual fund that have a worth of about $87.05 million. Vanguard Small Cap Index Fund, after buying 1.18 million shares, have now control over 2.46% of the stake in the company. It holds 6432.0 shares of worth $73.49 million.
Freshpet Inc. (NASDAQ: FRPT) started trading at $54.58, below -$0.07 from concluding price of the previous day. However, the stock later moved at a day high price of 59.38, or with a gain of 6.62%. Stock saw a price change of -2.54% in past 5 days and over the past one month there was a price change of -11.13%. Year-to-date (YTD), FRPT shares are showing a performance of 10.42% which decreased to -31.66% when we look at its performance for past 12 months. Over the period of past 52 weeks, stock dropped to lowest price of $36.02 but also hit the highest price of $118.77 during that period. The average intraday trading volume for Freshpet Inc. shares is 728.75K. The stock is currently trading -5.33% below its 20-day simple moving average (SMA20), while that difference is down -4.85% for SMA50 and it goes to 3.81% higher than SMA200.
The Vanguard Group, Inc. acquired 4.36 million shares of Freshpet Inc. having value of about $270.97 million. Data submitted at the U.S SEC by The Vanguard Group, Inc. revealed that the firm now holds 94864.0 shares in the company valued at close to $5527725.28, or have control over 2.23% stake in the company. Holding of mutual funds in the company is about 55.13% while other institutional holders and individual stake holders have control over 60.30% and 17.58% of the stake respectively.
The stock has a current market capitalization of $2.95B and its 3Y-monthly beta is at 0.97. It has posted earnings per share of -$1.30 in the same period. It has Quick Ratio of 2.30 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 FRPT, volatility over the week remained 12.40% while standing at 6.84% over the month.
Analysts are in expectations that Freshpet Inc. (FRPT) stock would likely to be making an EPS of -$0.09 in the current quarter, while forecast for next quarter EPS is -$0.31 and it is -$0.6 for next year. For the current quarter EPS, analysts have given the company a lowest target -$0.18 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 -$0.19 in the same quarter a year ago. Stock’s fiscal year EPS is expected to drop by -86.20% while it is estimated to increase by 77.60% in next year.
Analysts at 16 brokerage firms have issued recommendations for the Freshpet Inc. (FRPT)’s stock and average of those rates the stock at a “Strong Buy” and assign it a score of 1.80. Out of those 16 Wall Street analysts, 12 recommended a “Buy” rating, while 3 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 Citigroup on November 03, 2022 offering a Neutral rating for the stock and assigned a target price range of between $32 and $66 to it. Coverage by UBS stated Freshpet Inc. (FRPT) stock as a Buy in their note to investors on September 30, 2022, suggesting a price target of $67 for the stock. On September 08, 2022, Truist Downgrade their recommendations, while on August 18, 2022, Piper Sandler Initiated their ratings for the stock with a price target of $69. Stock get a Neutral rating from Atlantic Equities on May 20, 2022.
