StoneCo Sees Unusually High Options Volume (NASDAQ:STNE)

StoneCo Ltd. (NASDAQ:STNE) was the recipient of some unusual options trading activity on Thursday. Stock investors purchased 12,729 call options on the stock. This represents an increase of 122% compared to the average volume of 5,744 call options.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On StoneCo

A number of institutional investors and hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in the business. Corient Private Wealth LLC grew its position in shares of StoneCo by 2.1% during the 4th quarter. Corient Private Wealth LLC now owns 33,227 shares of the company’s stock valued at $599,000 after acquiring an additional 692 shares during the period. Financial Perspectives Inc grew its position in StoneCo by 8.4% during the 2nd quarter. Financial Perspectives Inc now owns 14,019 shares of the company’s stock worth $168,000 after acquiring an additional 1,083 shares during the last quarter. TrinityPoint Wealth LLC raised its stake in shares of StoneCo by 11.1% during the fourth quarter. TrinityPoint Wealth LLC now owns 11,696 shares of the company’s stock valued at $211,000 after acquiring an additional 1,167 shares during the last quarter. Private Advisor Group LLC increased its position in StoneCo by 4.2% during the 4th quarter. Private Advisor Group LLC now owns 32,874 shares of the company’s stock valued at $593,000 after purchasing an additional 1,329 shares during the period. Finally, USA Financial Formulas bought a new stake in StoneCo during the 4th quarter valued at approximately $26,000. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 73.19% of the company’s stock.

StoneCo Price Performance

Shares of NASDAQ:STNE opened at $11.80 on Friday. The company has a quick ratio of 1.36, a current ratio of 1.36 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.41. The stock’s 50 day moving average is $13.12 and its 200-day moving average is $14.60. StoneCo has a twelve month low of $9.34 and a twelve month high of $19.46. The firm has a market capitalization of $3.71 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 10.63, a PEG ratio of 0.47 and a beta of 2.31.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of research firms have recently issued reports on STNE. Evercore ISI cut their price objective on StoneCo from $25.00 to $23.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a research report on Tuesday, June 25th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. raised StoneCo from a “neutral” rating to an “overweight” rating and set a $20.00 target price on the stock in a report on Thursday, June 6th. The Goldman Sachs Group decreased their price target on StoneCo from $21.00 to $15.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research note on Wednesday, June 26th. Barclays decreased their target price on shares of StoneCo from $16.00 to $14.00 and set an “equal weight” rating on the stock in a research note on Thursday, August 1st. Finally, UBS Group raised their price objective on shares of StoneCo from $17.00 to $18.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Thursday, August 29th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, one has assigned a hold rating and eight have assigned a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $17.80.

About StoneCo

StoneCo Ltd. provides financial technology and software solutions to merchants and integrated partners to conduct electronic commerce across in-store, online, and mobile channels in Brazil. It distributes its solutions, principally through proprietary Stone Hubs, which offer hyper-local sales and services; and sells solutions to brick-and-mortar and digital merchants through sales team.