Utz Brands Inc (NYSE: UTZ) stock fell -1.97% on Monday to $12.92 against a previous-day closing price of $13.18. With 0.68 million shares changed hands, the volume of the stock remained heavier than its average volume of 0.68 million shares. During the session, the Packaged Foods company that operates in wider Consumer Defensive sector, reached to the highest price of $13.23 whereas the lowest price it dropped to was $12.84. The 52-week range on UTZ shows that it touched its highest point at $19.15 and its lowest point at $11.17 during that stretch. It currently has a 1-year price target of $15.50. With its current market cap of 1.05 billion, UTZ has annualized dividend of $0.29 while the current yield stands at 2.28%. Beta for the stock currently stands at 0.87.
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 UTZ was up-trending over the past week, with a rise of 4.79%, but this was up by 11.09% over a month. Three-month performance dropped to -12.82% while six-month performance fell -22.59%. The stock lost -27.86% in the past year, while it has lost -18.54% so far this year. A look at the trailing 12-month EPS for UTZ yields 0.21 with Next year EPS estimates of 0.63. For the next quarter, that number is 0.16. This implies an EPS growth rate of 2.55% for this year and 10.99% for next year.
Float and Shares Shorts:
At present, 80.88 million UTZ shares are outstanding with a float of 65.53 million shares on hand for trading. On Oct 30, 2023, short shares totaled 6.19 million, which was 7.63% higher than short shares on Sep 28, 2023. In addition to Mr. Howard A. Friedman as the firm’s CEO & Director, Mr. Michael W. Rice serves as its Chairman Emeritus, Special Advisor & Director.
Institutional Ownership:
Through their ownership of 85.18% of UTZ’s outstanding shares, institutional investors have majority control over the company. Other institutions hold 48.42% of UTZ, in contrast to 38.43% held by mutual funds. Shares owned by individuals account for 19.58%. As the largest shareholder in UTZ with 8.09% of the stake, The Vanguard Group, Inc. holds 6,561,256 shares worth 6,561,256. A second-largest stockholder of UTZ, Champlain Investment Partners LLC, holds 5,940,140 shares, controlling over 7.32% of the firm’s shares. JPMorgan Investment Management, I is the third largest shareholder in UTZ, holding 4,784,948 shares or 5.90% stake. With a 4.14% stake in UTZ, the JPMorgan Small Cap Equity Fund is the largest stakeholder. A total of 3,363,490 shares are owned by the mutual fund manager. The Baron Small Cap Fund, which owns about 4.01% of UTZ stock, is the second-largest Mutual Fund holder. It holds 3,250,000 shares valued at 39.62 million. Neuberger Berman Genesis Fund holds 3.38% of the stake in UTZ, owning 2,741,244 shares worth 33.42 million.
Analysts Ratings:
Reading analyst opinions is an effective way to decide where to invest, and there are several opinions available for UTZ 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 UTZ analysts setting a high price target of $17.00 and a low target of $13.00, the average target price over the next 12 months is $15.50. Based on these targets, UTZ could surge 31.58% to reach the target high and rise by 0.62% to reach the target low. Reaching the average price target will result in a growth of 19.97% from current levels.
Summary of Insider Activity:
Insiders traded UTZ 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 43 while that of sell transactions has risen to 9 over the past year. The total number of shares bought during that period was 736,535 while 1,726,879 shares were sold.
