Applied Therapeutics (NASDAQ:APLT) Sees Large Volume Increase on Analyst Upgrade

Applied Therapeutics, Inc. (NASDAQ:APLT) saw unusually-strong trading volume on Thursday after Leerink Partners raised their price target on the stock from $11.00 to $14.00. Leerink Partners currently has an outperform rating on the stock. Approximately 885,436 shares traded hands during mid-day trading, a decline of 49% from the previous session’s volume of 1,721,531 shares.The stock last traded at $7.91 and had previously closed at $7.85.

APLT has been the topic of several other reports. Royal Bank of Canada reiterated an “outperform” rating and issued a $12.00 price target on shares of Applied Therapeutics in a report on Wednesday, July 17th. William Blair upgraded Applied Therapeutics to a “strong-buy” rating in a research note on Friday, August 30th. Finally, Citigroup boosted their price objective on shares of Applied Therapeutics from $7.00 to $8.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Tuesday, August 27th. Five equities research analysts have rated the stock with a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the company has a consensus rating of “Buy” and a consensus price target of $11.75.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, CEO Shoshana Shendelman sold 119,591 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Wednesday, August 14th. The stock was sold at an average price of $5.93, for a total value of $709,174.63. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 4,690,839 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $27,816,675.27. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through the SEC website. Corporate insiders own 8.60% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Trading of Applied Therapeutics

Institutional investors have recently bought and sold shares of the stock. Algert Global LLC acquired a new position in Applied Therapeutics during the 2nd quarter valued at approximately $110,000. Frazier Life Sciences Management L.P. grew its holdings in shares of Applied Therapeutics by 17.1% during the second quarter. Frazier Life Sciences Management L.P. now owns 2,286,135 shares of the company’s stock valued at $10,676,000 after buying an additional 333,278 shares during the last quarter. The Manufacturers Life Insurance Company purchased a new stake in shares of Applied Therapeutics during the second quarter valued at $172,000. Sei Investments Co. acquired a new position in shares of Applied Therapeutics in the 2nd quarter valued at $535,000. Finally, Victory Capital Management Inc. purchased a new position in Applied Therapeutics in the 2nd quarter worth $54,000. 98.31% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Applied Therapeutics Trading Up 8.0 %

The stock has a 50-day simple moving average of $5.71 and a 200 day simple moving average of $5.31. The company has a market cap of $968.98 million, a price-to-earnings ratio of -4.27 and a beta of 2.03.

Applied Therapeutics (NASDAQ:APLT) last released its earnings results on Wednesday, August 7th. The company reported ($0.13) EPS for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of ($0.10) by ($0.03). The company had revenue of $0.14 million during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $10.00 million. As a group, research analysts forecast that Applied Therapeutics, Inc. will post -0.48 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Applied Therapeutics Company Profile

Applied Therapeutics, Inc, a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company, engages in the development of a pipeline of novel product candidates against validated molecular targets in indications of high unmet medical need in the United States. The company's lead product candidate is AT-007 (also called govorestat) that has completed phase 3 for the treatment of galactosemia in healthy volunteers and adults, in pediatric clinical study for the treatment of galactosemia in kids, for treating enzyme sorbitol dehydrogenase, and for the treatment of phosphomannomutase enzyme-CDG.