ArcBest Co. (NASDAQ:ARCB) Sees Significant Growth in Short Interest

ArcBest Co. (NASDAQ:ARCB) was the target of a large increase in short interest in June. As of June 15th, there was short interest totalling 1,740,000 shares, an increase of 16.0% from the May 31st total of 1,500,000 shares. Approximately 7.6% of the company’s stock are sold short. Based on an average daily volume of 316,600 shares, the days-to-cover ratio is presently 5.5 days.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On ArcBest

Large investors have recently bought and sold shares of the company. Contravisory Investment Management Inc. raised its position in ArcBest by 70.9% during the 1st quarter. Contravisory Investment Management Inc. now owns 188 shares of the transportation company’s stock worth $27,000 after buying an additional 78 shares during the last quarter. EverSource Wealth Advisors LLC raised its holdings in shares of ArcBest by 49.3% during the fourth quarter. EverSource Wealth Advisors LLC now owns 227 shares of the transportation company’s stock worth $27,000 after purchasing an additional 75 shares during the last quarter. GAMMA Investing LLC acquired a new position in ArcBest during the fourth quarter valued at $39,000. Parallel Advisors LLC boosted its holdings in ArcBest by 45.8% in the fourth quarter. Parallel Advisors LLC now owns 363 shares of the transportation company’s stock valued at $44,000 after purchasing an additional 114 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Headlands Technologies LLC acquired a new stake in ArcBest during the 1st quarter worth about $73,000. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 99.27% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several equities analysts recently issued reports on ARCB shares. UBS Group cut their price objective on shares of ArcBest from $150.00 to $126.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a report on Wednesday, May 1st. TD Cowen reduced their price target on ArcBest from $177.00 to $148.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research report on Wednesday, May 1st. JPMorgan Chase & Co. dropped their price objective on ArcBest from $164.00 to $145.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a research report on Wednesday, May 1st. Wells Fargo & Company started coverage on shares of ArcBest in a report on Friday, June 7th. They issued an “overweight” rating and a $140.00 target price for the company. Finally, The Goldman Sachs Group raised their price target on shares of ArcBest from $133.00 to $149.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a report on Thursday, April 11th. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, four have issued a hold rating and nine have assigned a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $145.00.

ArcBest Stock Up 1.9 %

NASDAQ:ARCB opened at $107.08 on Monday. The company has a current ratio of 1.23, a quick ratio of 1.23 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.12. ArcBest has a twelve month low of $86.93 and a twelve month high of $153.60. The company has a market cap of $2.51 billion, a PE ratio of 21.55, a P/E/G ratio of 0.83 and a beta of 1.49. The company’s 50 day moving average is $112.38 and its two-hundred day moving average is $124.90.

ArcBest (NASDAQ:ARCB) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, April 30th. The transportation company reported $1.34 earnings per share for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.53 by ($0.19). ArcBest had a net margin of 2.80% and a return on equity of 15.27%. The company had revenue of $1.04 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $1.03 billion. During the same period last year, the firm earned $1.58 earnings per share. ArcBest’s quarterly revenue was down 6.3% compared to the same quarter last year. Analysts anticipate that ArcBest will post 8.54 EPS for the current year.

ArcBest Dividend Announcement

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, May 24th. Stockholders of record on Friday, May 10th were paid a $0.12 dividend. This represents a $0.48 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.45%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Thursday, May 9th. ArcBest’s payout ratio is 9.66%.

ArcBest Company Profile

ArcBest Corporation, an integrated logistics company, engages in the provision of ground, air, and ocean transportation solutions. It operates through two segments: Asset-Based and Asset-Light. The Asset-Based segment provides less-than-truckload (LTL) services, that transports general commodities, such as food, textiles, apparel, furniture, appliances, chemicals, non-bulk petroleum products, rubber, plastics, metal and metal products, wood, glass, automotive parts, machinery, and miscellaneous manufactured products.