National Pension Service Purchases New Stake in StoneCo Ltd. (NASDAQ:STNE)

National Pension Service acquired a new position in shares of StoneCo Ltd. (NASDAQ:STNE) during the third quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The fund acquired 81,300 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $915,000.

A number of other institutional investors and hedge funds also recently added to or reduced their stakes in STNE. Point72 Asset Management L.P. raised its holdings in shares of StoneCo by 10.2% during the 2nd quarter. Point72 Asset Management L.P. now owns 8,386,945 shares of the company’s stock worth $100,559,000 after acquiring an additional 779,445 shares during the period. Marshall Wace LLP raised its stake in StoneCo by 204.1% during the second quarter. Marshall Wace LLP now owns 7,741,662 shares of the company’s stock worth $92,823,000 after purchasing an additional 5,195,787 shares during the period. Coronation Fund Managers Ltd. boosted its holdings in StoneCo by 43.4% in the 3rd quarter. Coronation Fund Managers Ltd. now owns 3,673,459 shares of the company’s stock valued at $41,363,000 after purchasing an additional 1,111,065 shares during the last quarter. Constellation Investimentos e Participacoes Ltda grew its stake in shares of StoneCo by 30.0% in the 3rd quarter. Constellation Investimentos e Participacoes Ltda now owns 3,047,576 shares of the company’s stock valued at $34,316,000 after buying an additional 703,249 shares during the period. Finally, Vanguard Group Inc. increased its holdings in shares of StoneCo by 3.5% during the 1st quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 2,636,619 shares of the company’s stock worth $43,794,000 after buying an additional 88,256 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 73.19% of the company’s stock.

StoneCo Stock Performance

Shares of StoneCo stock opened at $11.35 on Friday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.41, a current ratio of 1.36 and a quick ratio of 1.36. The stock has a market capitalization of $3.51 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 9.23, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 0.40 and a beta of 2.29. The business has a 50-day moving average of $11.48 and a 200 day moving average of $12.96. StoneCo Ltd. has a 12 month low of $10.20 and a 12 month high of $19.46.

StoneCo (NASDAQ:STNE) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, August 14th. The company reported $0.30 EPS for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $0.34 by ($0.04). StoneCo had a net margin of 15.27% and a return on equity of 13.21%. The business had revenue of $615.13 million during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $590.74 million. As a group, sell-side analysts forecast that StoneCo Ltd. will post 1.21 earnings per share for the current year.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of research analysts recently commented on STNE shares. UBS Group upped their price objective on StoneCo from $17.00 to $18.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Thursday, August 29th. Cantor Fitzgerald raised StoneCo to a “strong-buy” rating in a research note on Thursday, October 3rd. Barclays cut their price objective on StoneCo from $14.00 to $13.00 and set an “equal weight” rating for the company in a research report on Tuesday, October 15th. Finally, Morgan Stanley reaffirmed an “underweight” rating and issued a $7.00 target price (down previously from $16.50) on shares of StoneCo in a research report on Thursday, September 5th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, one has given a hold rating, seven have assigned a buy rating and one has issued a strong buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $17.70.

StoneCo Profile

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.