Evolent Health Inc. (NYSE: EVH): To Buy Or Not To Buy, That Is The Question

Fidelity Management & Research Co has recently announced that it has increased stake in Evolent Health Inc. (NYSE:EVH) by 245.73%. After grabbing 13.02 million shares, the institutional investor is now in possession of 9.26 million shares of the Healthcare Company. The new investment brought the stake of investor firm to 11.73% having worth around $474.22 million. Moreover, Granahan Investment Management, L increased its share by 0.2 million to have a control over 3.37 million shares. And JPMorgan Investment Management, I raised its holdings to 0.17 million shares by acquiring 3.09 million shares or 2.79% of the stake.

Evolent Health Inc. (EVH) concluded trading on 05/25/23 at a closing price of $29.09, with 1.77 million shares of worth about $51.53 million changed hands on the day. Half year performance of the stock remained positive as price took a surge of 5.90% during that period and on Thursday the price saw a loss of about -5.80%. Currently the company’s common shares owned by public are about 107.78M shares, out of which, 93.07M 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: 10 analysts are covering the EVH stock and their offered price forecasts bring an average price target of $47.56. Over the next 12 months, analysts forecasted that the stock’s price could jump as high as $63.00 and could fall to a lowest price of $36.00. The stock’s current price level is 38.43% above of average price target set by the analysts, while a rise to estimated low would result in gain of 19.19% for the stock. However, touching the estimated high of $63.00 would mean a gain of 53.83% 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 80 times over the past 12 months. They bought 2,342,960 shares in 35 of the transactions. In 45 selling transactions, insiders dumped 1,633,981 shares.

Vanguard Total Stock Market ETF, Vanguard Small Cap Index Fund, and JPMorgan Funds – Global Healthcar are the top 3 mutual funds which are holding stakes in Evolent Health Inc. Vanguard Total Stock Market ETF is currently holding 2.83 million shares of worth totaling $103.16 million. The company recently came buying 1255.0 shares which brought its stake up to 2.55% of the company’s outstanding shares. Vanguard Small Cap Index Fund sold 582.0 shares, after which its hold over company’s outstanding shares shrunk to 2.15%, leaving 2.38 million shares with the mutual fund that have a worth of about $86.75 million. JPMorgan Funds – Global Healthcar, after buying 1.94 million shares, have now control over 1.75% of the stake in the company. It holds 0.0 shares of worth $70.66 million.

Evolent Health Inc. (NYSE: EVH) started trading at $30.76, below -$0.12 from concluding price of the previous day. Stock saw a price change of -11.85% in past 5 days and over the past one month there was a price change of -17.40%. Year-to-date (YTD), EVH shares are showing a performance of 3.60% which increased to 1.64% when we look at its performance for past 12 months. Over the period of past 52 weeks, stock dropped to lowest price of $21.83 but also hit the highest price of $39.78 during that period. The average intraday trading volume for Evolent Health Inc. shares is 930.44K. The stock is currently trading -15.22% below its 20-day simple moving average (SMA20), while that difference is down -12.35% for SMA50 and it goes to -9.27% lower than SMA200.

Fidelity Management & Research Co acquired 13.02 million shares of Evolent Health Inc. having value of about $474.22 million. Data submitted at the U.S SEC by Fidelity Management & Research Co revealed that the firm now holds 9.26 million shares in the company valued at close to $269291860.73, or have control over 245.73% stake in the company. Evolent Health Inc. (NYSE: EVH) currently have 107.78M outstanding shares and institutions hold larger chunk of about 96.80% of that. Holding of mutual funds in the company is about 49.48% while other institutional holders and individual stake holders have control over 51.00% and 12.39% of the stake respectively.

The stock has a current market capitalization of $3.29B and its 3Y-monthly beta is at 1.54. It has posted earnings per share of -$0.38 in the same period. It has Quick Ratio of 1.00 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 EVH, volatility over the week remained 4.24% while standing at 3.76% over the month.

Analysts are in expectations that Evolent Health Inc. (EVH) stock would likely to be making an EPS of $0.13 in the current quarter, while forecast for next quarter EPS is $0.09 and it is $1.06 for next year. For the current quarter EPS, analysts have given the company a lowest target -$0.08 which is $0.21 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 $0.1 in the same quarter a year ago. Stock’s fiscal year EPS is expected to rise by 43.30% while it is estimated to increase by 85.79% in next year. EPS is likely to grow at an annualized rate of 30.00% for next 5-years, compared to annual growth of 26.70% made by the stock over the past 5-years.

Analysts at 10 brokerage firms have issued recommendations for the Evolent Health Inc. (EVH)’s stock and average of those rates the stock at a “Strong Buy” and assign it a score of 1.60. Out of those 10 Wall Street analysts, 9 recommended a “Buy” rating, while 1 were in favor recommending the stock as a “Hold” and 0 analyst recommended the stock as “Sell”.