Azul Sees Unusually Large Options Volume (NYSE:AZUL)

Azul S.A. (NYSE:AZUL) was the target of some unusual options trading activity on Monday. Investors acquired 6,075 put options on the company. This represents an increase of 125% compared to the average volume of 2,695 put options.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Azul

Several institutional investors have recently bought and sold shares of the business. Inspire Advisors LLC grew its stake in Azul by 84.0% during the third quarter. Inspire Advisors LLC now owns 41,324 shares of the company’s stock worth $142,000 after buying an additional 18,861 shares during the period. Kapitalo Investimentos Ltda purchased a new position in shares of Azul in the third quarter valued at $306,000. Creative Planning purchased a new position in shares of Azul in the third quarter valued at $35,000. Perpetual Ltd boosted its stake in shares of Azul by 4.5% in the third quarter. Perpetual Ltd now owns 2,354,953 shares of the company’s stock valued at $8,101,000 after purchasing an additional 100,639 shares during the period. Finally, Sanctuary Advisors LLC purchased a new position in shares of Azul in the second quarter valued at $51,000. 0.82% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Azul Trading Down 3.5 %

Shares of AZUL opened at $3.02 on Wednesday. The company has a 50-day moving average of $3.22 and a two-hundred day moving average of $4.52. The stock has a market cap of $1.27 billion, a P/E ratio of -1.24 and a beta of 1.98. Azul has a 12-month low of $2.02 and a 12-month high of $11.26.

Azul (NYSE:AZUL) last released its earnings results on Monday, August 12th. The company reported ($1.23) earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of ($0.60) by ($0.63). The company had revenue of $800.65 million for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $791.43 million. During the same period last year, the firm posted ($0.81) EPS. As a group, analysts forecast that Azul will post -1.73 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several equities research analysts recently commented on AZUL shares. Hsbc Global Res upgraded shares of Azul to a “hold” rating in a research note on Thursday, September 5th. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft lowered their price objective on shares of Azul from $8.00 to $6.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research report on Tuesday, August 13th. Barclays lowered their target price on shares of Azul from $10.00 to $4.50 and set an “equal weight” rating on the stock in a report on Monday, August 19th. HSBC downgraded shares of Azul from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating and set a $2.70 target price on the stock. in a report on Thursday, September 5th. Finally, Seaport Res Ptn cut shares of Azul from a “strong-buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Thursday, October 10th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, seven have issued a hold rating and two have issued a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat, Azul has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $6.59.

About Azul

Azul SA, together with its subsidiaries, provides air transportation services in Brazil and internationally. As of December 31, 2023, the company operated approximately 1,000 daily departures to 160 destinations through a network of 300 non-stop routes with an operating fleet of 183 aircraft and a passenger contractual fleet of 189 aircraft.