Keefe, Bruyette & Woods Forecasts Strong Price Appreciation for Equity Bancshares (NASDAQ:EQBK) Stock

Equity Bancshares (NASDAQ:EQBK) had its price objective upped by equities researchers at Keefe, Bruyette & Woods from $43.00 to $48.00 in a research report issued on Wednesday,Benzinga reports. The firm presently has a “market perform” rating on the bank’s stock. Keefe, Bruyette & Woods’ target price would indicate a potential upside of 1.42% from the stock’s current price.

A number of other brokerages also recently issued reports on EQBK. DA Davidson boosted their price objective on Equity Bancshares from $42.00 to $45.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Thursday, October 17th. Stephens upgraded Equity Bancshares from an “equal weight” rating to an “overweight” rating and set a $46.00 target price on the stock in a research report on Monday, October 14th.

Equity Bancshares Stock Down 0.9 %

NASDAQ:EQBK traded down $0.43 on Wednesday, reaching $47.33. 12,790 shares of the stock traded hands, compared to its average volume of 47,919. Equity Bancshares has a 12 month low of $26.77 and a 12 month high of $50.85. The company has a market capitalization of $723.68 million, a price-to-earnings ratio of 43.03 and a beta of 0.90. The company’s fifty day simple moving average is $44.00 and its 200 day simple moving average is $39.52. The company has a current ratio of 0.86, a quick ratio of 0.86 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.78.

Equity Bancshares (NASDAQ:EQBK) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, October 15th. The bank reported $1.31 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.99 by $0.32. The firm had revenue of $55.35 million for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $55.77 million. Equity Bancshares had a net margin of 6.36% and a return on equity of 13.53%. Equities analysts predict that Equity Bancshares will post 4.27 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Insider Transactions at Equity Bancshares

In other Equity Bancshares news, Director Leon Borck acquired 1,467 shares of Equity Bancshares stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, September 12th. The stock was bought at an average price of $38.77 per share, with a total value of $56,875.59. Following the completion of the purchase, the director now directly owns 11,941 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $462,952.57. This represents a 14.01 % increase in their position. The purchase was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through the SEC website. Also, CEO Brad S. Elliott sold 2,300 shares of Equity Bancshares stock in a transaction on Wednesday, September 18th. The shares were sold at an average price of $42.64, for a total value of $98,072.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer now owns 151,979 shares in the company, valued at $6,480,384.56. This represents a 1.49 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Corporate insiders own 8.00% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Several large investors have recently modified their holdings of EQBK. Foundry Partners LLC grew its holdings in Equity Bancshares by 13.8% in the third quarter. Foundry Partners LLC now owns 119,525 shares of the bank’s stock worth $4,886,000 after purchasing an additional 14,540 shares during the last quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. increased its position in Equity Bancshares by 1.5% during the 1st quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 754,069 shares of the bank’s stock valued at $25,917,000 after buying an additional 10,868 shares in the last quarter. Mendon Capital Advisors Corp raised its stake in Equity Bancshares by 2,539.9% in the second quarter. Mendon Capital Advisors Corp now owns 350,000 shares of the bank’s stock valued at $12,320,000 after buying an additional 336,742 shares during the last quarter. ELCO Management Co. LLC boosted its holdings in Equity Bancshares by 3.1% in the second quarter. ELCO Management Co. LLC now owns 13,673 shares of the bank’s stock worth $481,000 after acquiring an additional 415 shares in the last quarter. Finally, SG Americas Securities LLC grew its stake in shares of Equity Bancshares by 74.1% during the third quarter. SG Americas Securities LLC now owns 5,052 shares of the bank’s stock worth $207,000 after acquiring an additional 2,150 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors own 71.80% of the company’s stock.

About Equity Bancshares

Equity Bancshares, Inc operates as the bank holding company for Equity Bank that provides a range of banking, mortgage banking, and financial services to individual and corporate customers. The company accepts various demand, savings, money market, and time deposits. Its loan products include commercial and industrial, commercial real estate, commercial lines of credit, working capital, term, equipment and aircraft financing, acquisition, expansion and development, borrowing base, real estate construction, homebuilder, agricultural, government guaranteed, and other loan products.