The Kroger Co. (NYSE: KR) stock jumped 0.94% on Wednesday to $49.56 against a previous-day closing price of $49.10. With 5.84 million shares changed hands, the volume of the stock remained heavier than its average volume of 5.62 million shares. During the session, the Grocery Stores company that operates in wider Consumer Defensive sector, reached to the highest price of $50.08 whereas the lowest price it dropped to was $49.20. The 52-week range on KR shows that it touched its highest point at $53.47 and its lowest point at $41.81 during that stretch. It currently has a 1-year price target of $52.13. With its current market cap of 35.34 billion, KR has annualized dividend of $1.04 while the current yield stands at 2.10%. Beta for the stock currently stands at 0.47.
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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 KR was up-trending over the past week, with a rise of 0.63%, but this was up by 3.31% over a month. Three-month performance surged to 12.87% while six-month performance rose 2.99%. The stock lost -1.31% in the past year, while it has gained 11.17% so far this year. A look at the trailing 12-month EPS for KR yields 3.06 with Next year EPS estimates of 4.52. For the next quarter, that number is 0.92. This implies an EPS growth rate of 40.70% for this year and 0.78% for next year. EPS is expected to grow by 8.00% annually over the next five years; however, over the past five years, the company experienced an annual growth rate of 23.40%.
Float and Shares Shorts:
At present, 715.00 million KR shares are outstanding with a float of 711.31 million shares on hand for trading. On Apr 27, 2023, short shares totaled 15.27 million, which was 2.13% higher than short shares on Mar 30, 2023. In addition to KO as the firm’s Coca-Cola Company (The), KRE serves as its SPDR S&P Regional Banking ETF.
Institutional Ownership:
Through their ownership of 80.98% of KR’s outstanding shares, institutional investors have majority control over the company. Other institutions hold 41.99% of KR, in contrast to 39.05% held by mutual funds. Shares owned by individuals account for 2.50%. As the largest shareholder in KR with 11.14% of the stake, The Vanguard Group, Inc. holds 79,928,062 shares worth 79,928,062. A second-largest stockholder of KR, Berkshire Hathaway, Inc., holds 50,000,000 shares, controlling over 6.97% of the firm’s shares. BlackRock Fund Advisors is the third largest shareholder in KR, holding 42,577,075 shares or 5.93% stake. With a 2.79% stake in KR, the Vanguard Total Stock Market ETF is the largest stakeholder. A total of 20,016,698 shares are owned by the mutual fund manager. The Vanguard Mid Cap Index Fund, which owns about 2.10% of KR stock, is the second-largest Mutual Fund holder. It holds 15,035,369 shares valued at 731.17 million. Vanguard 500 Index Fund holds 1.99% of the stake in KR, owning 14,289,503 shares worth 694.9 million.
An Overview of Recent Financials:
Understanding a company as a customer does not mean you will understand it as an investor. The wise investor uses quantitative research to analyze metrics such as revenue, net income, and earnings. In its fiscal quarter reported on Jan 27, 2023, KR reported revenue of $44.60B and operating income of $1.50B. The EBITDA in the recently reported quarter was $2.60B and diluted EPS was $0.90.
Analysts Ratings:
Reading analyst opinions is an effective way to decide where to invest, and there are several opinions available for KR since 0 analysts follow the stock currently. In the same way, a target price assigned to a stock can also reveal much about its potential. With KR analysts setting a high price target of $75.00 and a low target of $36.00, the average target price over the next 12 months is $52.23. Based on these targets, KR could surge 51.33% to reach the target high and fall by -27.36% to reach the target low. Reaching the average price target will result in a growth of 5.39% 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.
Summary of Insider Activity:
Insiders traded KR stock several times over the past three months with 45 Buys and 44 Sells. In these transactions, 834,561 shares were bought while 483,807 shares were sold. The number of buy transactions has increased to 60 while that of sell transactions has risen to 70 over the past year. The total number of shares bought during that period was 921,296 while 594,969 shares were sold.
