BJ’s Restaurants, Inc. (NASDAQ:BJRI) Given Consensus Recommendation of “Hold” by Brokerages

BJ’s Restaurants, Inc. (NASDAQ:BJRI) has earned a consensus rating of “Hold” from the six research firms that are currently covering the company, MarketBeat.com reports. One analyst has rated the stock with a sell recommendation, four have given a hold recommendation and one has assigned a buy recommendation to the company. The average 12 month price target among analysts that have covered the stock in the last year is $40.40.

Several equities research analysts recently commented on BJRI shares. Gordon Haskett upgraded shares of BJ’s Restaurants from an “underperform” rating to a “hold” rating and set a $36.00 target price on the stock in a research report on Wednesday, January 8th. Oppenheimer downgraded BJ’s Restaurants from an “outperform” rating to a “market perform” rating in a report on Tuesday, January 7th. Wedbush upped their target price on BJ’s Restaurants from $43.00 to $48.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a report on Friday, February 21st. Finally, Barclays raised their price target on shares of BJ’s Restaurants from $34.00 to $37.00 and gave the stock an “underweight” rating in a report on Friday, February 21st.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On BJ’s Restaurants

Several institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in BJRI. Quarry LP grew its stake in shares of BJ’s Restaurants by 764.9% in the 3rd quarter. Quarry LP now owns 813 shares of the restaurant operator’s stock valued at $26,000 after buying an additional 719 shares during the period. US Bancorp DE grew its stake in BJ’s Restaurants by 23.5% in the fourth quarter. US Bancorp DE now owns 1,902 shares of the restaurant operator’s stock valued at $67,000 after acquiring an additional 362 shares during the period. Headlands Technologies LLC acquired a new stake in BJ’s Restaurants in the fourth quarter valued at approximately $108,000. Arizona State Retirement System bought a new stake in shares of BJ’s Restaurants during the fourth quarter valued at approximately $200,000. Finally, Two Sigma Securities LLC acquired a new position in shares of BJ’s Restaurants during the fourth quarter worth approximately $201,000. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 99.95% of the company’s stock.

BJ’s Restaurants Trading Up 6.2 %

NASDAQ BJRI opened at $36.16 on Tuesday. The company has a market cap of $821.48 million, a price-to-earnings ratio of 53.18, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.81 and a beta of 2.10. BJ’s Restaurants has a twelve month low of $27.61 and a twelve month high of $41.72. The company has a quick ratio of 0.28, a current ratio of 0.04 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.18. The business’s fifty day moving average is $35.46 and its 200 day moving average is $34.96.

BJ’s Restaurants (NASDAQ:BJRI) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, February 20th. The restaurant operator reported $0.47 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.35 by $0.12. The firm had revenue of $344.34 million for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $336.48 million. BJ’s Restaurants had a return on equity of 8.76% and a net margin of 1.23%. As a group, sell-side analysts expect that BJ’s Restaurants will post 1.5 EPS for the current fiscal year.

BJ’s Restaurants Company Profile

BJ’s Restaurants, Inc owns and operates casual dining restaurants in the United States. Its restaurants offer pizzas, craft and other beers, appetizers, entrées, pastas, sandwiches, specialty salads, and desserts under brand name Pizookie. The company was formerly known as Chicago Pizza & Brewery, Inc and changed its name to BJ’s Restaurants, Inc in August 2004.