Leap Therapeutics Inc. (NASDAQ: LPTX) stock jumped 11.11% on Friday to $1.30 against a previous-day closing price of $1.17. With 1.19 million shares changed hands, the volume of the stock remained heavier than its average volume of 0.66 million shares. During the session, the Biotechnology company that operates in wider Healthcare sector, reached to the highest price of $1.3800 whereas the lowest price it dropped to was $1.1600. The 52-week range on LPTX shows that it touched its highest point at $4.17 and its lowest point at $0.92 during that stretch. It currently has a 1-year price target of $4.40. Beta for the stock currently stands at 0.55.
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Price Performance and Earnings:
Stock performance is one of the indicators that investors use to determine whether they will profit from a stock. The price performance of LPTX was up-trending over the past week, with a rise of 12.07%, but this was up by 15.04% over a month. Three-month performance surged to 23.81% while six-month performance fell -42.22%. The stock lost -22.62% in the past year, while it has lost -59.88% so far this year. A look at the trailing 12-month EPS for LPTX yields -0.55 with Next year EPS estimates of -0.45. For the next quarter, that number is -0.10. This implies an EPS growth rate of 25.40% for this year and -12.50% for next year. EPS is expected to decline by -2.49% annually over the next five years; however, over the past five years, the company experienced an annual growth rate of 29.60%.
Float and Shares Shorts:
At present, 88.32 million LPTX shares are outstanding with a float of 70.67 million shares on hand for trading. On Jul 14, 2022, short shares totaled 13.32 million, which was 15.08% higher than short shares on Jun 14, 2022. In addition to Mr. Douglas E. Onsi J.D. as the firm’s CFO, Gen. Counsel, Treasurer & Sec., Pres, CEO & Director, Mr. Augustine J. Lawlor serves as its Chief Operating Officer.
Institutional Ownership:
Through their ownership of 56.72% of LPTX’s outstanding shares, institutional investors have majority control over the company. Other institutions hold 5.56% of LPTX, in contrast to 39.54% held by mutual funds. Shares owned by individuals account for 24.68%. As the largest shareholder in LPTX with 9.00% of the stake, Perceptive Advisors LLC holds 7,951,448 shares worth 7,951,448. A second-largest stockholder of LPTX, Invus Public Equities Advisors LL, holds 4,000,000 shares, controlling over 4.53% of the firm’s shares. Rock Springs Capital Management L is the third largest shareholder in LPTX, holding 3,595,447 shares or 4.07% stake. With a 2.59% stake in LPTX, the Vanguard Total Stock Market Index is the largest stakeholder. A total of 2,289,511 shares are owned by the mutual fund manager. The Vanguard Extended Market Index Fu, which owns about 0.95% of LPTX stock, is the second-largest Mutual Fund holder. It holds 842,416 shares valued at 0.97 million. iShares Biotechnology ETF holds 0.63% of the stake in LPTX, owning 555,516 shares worth 0.64 million.
Analysts Ratings:
Reading analyst opinions is an effective way to decide where to invest, and there are several opinions available for LPTX since 5 analysts follow the stock currently. There are 3 analysts who recommend BUY ratings, while 0 suggest SELL ratings. Of the remaining analysts, 0 believe that the stock is worth HOLDING, 2 give it an OVERWEIGHT rating, and 0 thinks that it’s UNDERWEIGHT. In the same way, a target price assigned to a stock can also reveal much about its potential. With LPTX analysts setting a high price target of $6.00 and a low target of $3.00, the average target price over the next 12 months is $4.40. Based on these targets, LPTX could surge 361.54% to reach the target high and rise by 130.77% to reach the target low. Reaching the average price target will result in a growth of 238.46% from current levels.
EPS: Estimates vs Actual
It is also common to use earnings estimates to evaluate a firm’s growth potential and to determine trading strategy. LPTX will report FY 2022 earnings on 03/10/2023. Analysts have provided yearly estimates in a range of -$0.37 being high and -$0.44 being low. For LPTX, this leads to a yearly average estimate of -$0.40. The earnings surprise of a firm occurs when the actual results change from the consensus earnings estimate. Leap Therapeutics Inc. surprised analysts by $0.01 when it reported -$0.09 EPS against a consensus estimate of -$0.10. The surprise factor in the prior quarter was $0.01. Based on analyst estimates, the high estimate for the next quarter is -$0.09 and the low estimate is -$0.11. The average estimate for the next quarter is thus -$0.10.
Summary of Insider Activity:
Insiders traded LPTX stock several times over the past three months with 0 Buys and 0 Sells. In these transactions, 0 shares were bought while 0 shares were sold. The number of buy transactions has increased to 1 while that of sell transactions has remained unmoved to 0 over the past year. The total number of shares bought during that period was 2,543,800 while 0 shares were sold.