Moderna (NASDAQ:MRNA) Lowered to Underweight at JPMorgan Chase & Co.

JPMorgan Chase & Co. lowered shares of Moderna (NASDAQ:MRNA) from a neutral rating to an underweight rating in a report released on Friday morning, Marketbeat reports. The brokerage currently has $70.00 target price on the stock, down from their previous target price of $88.00.

MRNA has been the subject of several other reports. Royal Bank of Canada cut Moderna from an outperform rating to a sector perform rating and lowered their target price for the company from $125.00 to $90.00 in a research note on Monday, August 5th. Barclays lowered their target price on Moderna from $168.00 to $155.00 and set an overweight rating for the company in a research note on Friday, August 2nd. Hsbc Global Res raised Moderna from a moderate sell rating to a hold rating in a research note on Wednesday, August 28th. Oppenheimer cut Moderna from an outperform rating to a market perform rating in a research note on Friday. Finally, Needham & Company LLC reaffirmed a hold rating on shares of Moderna in a research note on Thursday, August 1st. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, thirteen have given a hold rating and four have assigned a buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company currently has an average rating of Hold and an average price target of $108.53.

Moderna Stock Down 2.0 %

NASDAQ MRNA opened at $68.28 on Friday. The stock has a fifty day moving average of $95.06 and a 200-day moving average of $111.68. The stock has a market capitalization of $26.17 billion, a P/E ratio of -4.36 and a beta of 1.67. Moderna has a 52 week low of $62.55 and a 52 week high of $170.47. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.05, a quick ratio of 3.92 and a current ratio of 4.09.

Moderna (NASDAQ:MRNA) last released its earnings results on Thursday, August 1st. The company reported ($3.33) EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of ($3.47) by $0.14. The company had revenue of $241.00 million during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $128.41 million. Moderna had a negative return on equity of 21.35% and a negative net margin of 116.18%. The business’s revenue for the quarter was down 29.9% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period last year, the firm earned ($3.62) EPS. On average, equities research analysts forecast that Moderna will post -9.52 EPS for the current year.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Moderna news, President Stephen Hoge sold 15,000 shares of Moderna stock in a transaction dated Monday, June 17th. The stock was sold at an average price of $138.16, for a total transaction of $2,072,400.00. Following the transaction, the president now directly owns 1,457,089 shares in the company, valued at $201,311,416.24. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is accessible through this hyperlink. In other news, President Stephen Hoge sold 15,000 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, June 17th. The stock was sold at an average price of $138.16, for a total value of $2,072,400.00. Following the sale, the president now directly owns 1,457,089 shares in the company, valued at $201,311,416.24. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is accessible through the SEC website. Also, CFO James M. Mock sold 1,321 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, August 28th. The shares were sold at an average price of $79.39, for a total value of $104,874.19. Following the completion of the sale, the chief financial officer now owns 8,600 shares in the company, valued at $682,754. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last ninety days, insiders have sold 108,158 shares of company stock worth $13,239,712. Corporate insiders own 15.70% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Trading of Moderna

A number of institutional investors have recently modified their holdings of MRNA. Vanguard Group Inc. lifted its holdings in shares of Moderna by 22.6% in the fourth quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 33,907,072 shares of the company’s stock valued at $3,372,058,000 after purchasing an additional 6,248,623 shares in the last quarter. Norges Bank bought a new stake in Moderna during the fourth quarter worth about $347,565,000. Wellington Management Group LLP raised its holdings in Moderna by 28.8% during the fourth quarter. Wellington Management Group LLP now owns 7,225,579 shares of the company’s stock worth $718,584,000 after acquiring an additional 1,614,460 shares in the last quarter. Sumitomo Mitsui Trust Holdings Inc. raised its holdings in Moderna by 42.9% during the first quarter. Sumitomo Mitsui Trust Holdings Inc. now owns 1,545,829 shares of the company’s stock worth $164,724,000 after acquiring an additional 463,960 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Matrix Capital Management Company LP bought a new stake in Moderna during the fourth quarter worth about $45,150,000. 75.33% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Moderna Company Profile

Moderna, Inc, a biotechnology company, discovers, develops, and commercializes messenger RNA therapeutics and vaccines for the treatment of infectious diseases, immuno-oncology, rare diseases, autoimmune, and cardiovascular diseases in the United States, Europe, and internationally. Its respiratory vaccines include COVID-19, influenza, and respiratory syncytial virus, spikevax, and hMPV/PIV3 vaccines; latent vaccines comprise cytomegalovirus, epstein-barr virus, herpes simplex virus, varicella zoster virus, and human immunodeficiency virus vaccines; public health vaccines consists of Zika, Nipah, Mpox vaccines; and infectious diseases vaccines, such as lyme and norovirus vaccines.