EchoStar (NASDAQ:SATS) Sets New 1-Year High on Analyst Upgrade

Shares of EchoStar Co. (NASDAQ:SATS) hit a new 52-week high during mid-day trading on Friday after Morgan Stanley raised their price target on the stock from $14.00 to $20.00. Morgan Stanley currently has an equal weight rating on the stock. EchoStar traded as high as $23.16 and last traded at $23.08, with a volume of 309174 shares traded. The stock had previously closed at $22.27.

Several other research firms also recently weighed in on SATS. JPMorgan Chase & Co. reiterated an “underweight” rating and set a $12.00 target price on shares of EchoStar in a research report on Monday, August 12th. UBS Group increased their target price on shares of EchoStar from $14.00 to $15.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a report on Tuesday, August 13th. TD Cowen lowered their price target on shares of EchoStar from $38.00 to $37.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a report on Monday, August 12th. Finally, StockNews.com upgraded shares of EchoStar to a “sell” rating in a research report on Tuesday, July 30th. Two equities research analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, three have given a hold rating, one has issued a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $23.00.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

A number of institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in SATS. Russell Investments Group Ltd. increased its stake in EchoStar by 25,776.4% in the 4th quarter. Russell Investments Group Ltd. now owns 18,631 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock worth $309,000 after acquiring an additional 18,559 shares during the last quarter. Amalgamated Bank grew its stake in shares of EchoStar by 1,034.1% in the 4th quarter. Amalgamated Bank now owns 37,356 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock worth $619,000 after buying an additional 34,062 shares in the last quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. increased its holdings in shares of EchoStar by 53.8% in the 4th quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. now owns 1,095,327 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock worth $18,150,000 after buying an additional 383,030 shares during the last quarter. BNP Paribas Financial Markets lifted its holdings in shares of EchoStar by 118.4% in the 4th quarter. BNP Paribas Financial Markets now owns 31,595 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock valued at $524,000 after acquiring an additional 17,130 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Principal Financial Group Inc. grew its position in EchoStar by 4,541.5% in the fourth quarter. Principal Financial Group Inc. now owns 639,094 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock worth $10,590,000 after acquiring an additional 625,325 shares in the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 33.62% of the company’s stock.

EchoStar Stock Up 9.0 %

The company has a market capitalization of $6.59 billion, a P/E ratio of -3.15 and a beta of 0.70. The company has a 50 day simple moving average of $19.37 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $17.15. The company has a quick ratio of 0.32, a current ratio of 0.40 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.00.

EchoStar (NASDAQ:SATS) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Friday, August 9th. The communications equipment provider reported ($0.76) EPS for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of ($0.37) by ($0.39). The firm had revenue of $3.95 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $3.98 billion. EchoStar had a positive return on equity of 0.18% and a negative net margin of 18.65%. The firm’s quarterly revenue was down 9.3% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the previous year, the firm earned $0.39 earnings per share. As a group, equities analysts predict that EchoStar Co. will post -1.64 EPS for the current year.

EchoStar Company Profile

EchoStar Corporation, together with its subsidiaries, provides networking technologies and services worldwide. The company operates in four segments: Pay-TV, Retail Wireless, 5G Network Deployment, Broadband and Satellite Services. The Pay-TV segment offers a direct broadcast and fixed satellite services; designs, develops, and distributes receiver system; and provides digital broadcast operations, including satellite uplinking/downlinking, transmission and, other services to third-party pay-TV providers; and multichannel, live-linear and on-demand streaming over-the-top internet-based domestic, international, Latino, and Freestream video programming services under the DISH and SLING brand names.