Novavax, Inc. (NASDAQ: NVAX) stock fell -1.72% on Friday to $5.73 against a previous-day closing price of $5.83. With 6.13 million shares changed hands, the volume of the stock remained lighter than its average volume of 9.49 million shares. During the session, the Biotechnology company that operates in wider Healthcare sector, reached to the highest price of $5.96 whereas the lowest price it dropped to was $5.65. The 52-week range on NVAX shows that it touched its highest point at $21.34 and its lowest point at $5.61 during that stretch. It currently has a 1-year price target of $20.20. Beta for the stock currently stands at 1.61.
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 NVAX was down-trending over the past week, with a drop of -8.17%, but this was down by -6.22% over a month. Three-month performance dropped to -29.00% while six-month performance fell -19.86%. The stock lost -73.31% in the past year, while it has lost -44.26% so far this year. A look at the trailing 12-month EPS for NVAX yields -6.38 with Next year EPS estimates of -0.80. For the next quarter, that number is 0.16. This implies an EPS growth rate of 56.61% for this year and 78.19% for next year.
Float and Shares Shorts:
At present, 118.79 million NVAX shares are outstanding with a float of 110.21 million shares on hand for trading. On Oct 30, 2023, short shares totaled 44.91 million, which was 37.81% higher than short shares on Sep 28, 2023. In addition to Mr. James Patrick Kelly C.F.A. as the firm’s Executive VP, CFO & Treasurer, Mr. John A. Herrmann III, J.D. serves as its Executive VP & Chief Legal Officer.
Institutional Ownership:
Through their ownership of 70.61% of NVAX’s outstanding shares, institutional investors have majority control over the company. Other institutions hold 33.77% of NVAX, in contrast to 33.29% held by mutual funds. Shares owned by individuals account for 0.36%. As the largest shareholder in NVAX with 12.00% of the stake, The Vanguard Group, Inc. holds 11,324,656 shares worth 11,324,656. A second-largest stockholder of NVAX, SSgA Funds Management, Inc., holds 10,174,617 shares, controlling over 10.78% of the firm’s shares. Shah Capital Management, Inc. is the third largest shareholder in NVAX, holding 6,330,756 shares or 6.71% stake. With a 9.15% stake in NVAX, the SPDR S&P Biotech ETF is the largest stakeholder. A total of 8,633,042 shares are owned by the mutual fund manager. The Vanguard Total Stock Market ETF, which owns about 3.01% of NVAX stock, is the second-largest Mutual Fund holder. It holds 2,845,436 shares valued at 18.95 million. Vanguard Small Cap Index Fund holds 2.44% of the stake in NVAX, owning 2,304,712 shares worth 15.35 million.
Analysts Ratings:
Reading analyst opinions is an effective way to decide where to invest, and there are several opinions available for NVAX 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 NVAX analysts setting a high price target of $38.00 and a low target of $5.00, the average target price over the next 12 months is $20.20. Based on these targets, NVAX could surge 563.18% to reach the target high and fall by -12.74% to reach the target low. Reaching the average price target will result in a growth of 252.53% from current levels.
Summary of Insider Activity:
Insiders traded NVAX stock several times over the past three months with 2 Buys and 1 Sells. In these transactions, 16,444 shares were bought while 6,108 shares were sold. The number of buy transactions has increased to 24 while that of sell transactions has risen to 14 over the past year. The total number of shares bought during that period was 85,277 while 24,236 shares were sold.
