Cognex (NASDAQ:CGNX) Posts Quarterly Earnings Results, Misses Expectations By $0.01 EPS

Cognex (NASDAQ:CGNX) issued its earnings results on Wednesday. The scientific and technical instruments company reported $0.14 EPS for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.15 by ($0.01), Zacks reports. Cognex had a net margin of 10.10% and a return on equity of 5.28%. Cognex updated its Q1 2025 guidance to EPS.

Cognex Stock Performance

NASDAQ CGNX opened at $39.25 on Thursday. The firm’s 50 day moving average price is $37.96 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $39.22. The stock has a market cap of $6.73 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 75.48 and a beta of 1.40. Cognex has a twelve month low of $34.98 and a twelve month high of $53.13.

Cognex Announces Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, March 13th. Stockholders of record on Thursday, February 27th will be given a $0.08 dividend. This represents a $0.32 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.82%. Cognex’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is currently 61.54%.

Insider Activity at Cognex

In other news, CTO Joerg Kuechen sold 2,934 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, December 12th. The shares were sold at an average price of $37.75, for a total value of $110,758.50. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through the SEC website. Also, Director Anthony Sun sold 26,000 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, November 22nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $40.03, for a total transaction of $1,040,780.00. Following the sale, the director now owns 26,608 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $1,065,118.24. This represents a 49.42 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. 1.10% of the stock is owned by insiders.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several brokerages have issued reports on CGNX. Stephens reaffirmed an “overweight” rating and issued a $55.00 price objective on shares of Cognex in a research report on Thursday, January 2nd. Cantor Fitzgerald upgraded Cognex to a “strong-buy” rating in a research note on Friday, December 20th. Truist Financial lifted their price target on shares of Cognex from $42.00 to $43.00 and gave the stock a “hold” rating in a research note on Thursday, January 16th. Citigroup reduced their price objective on shares of Cognex from $44.00 to $42.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a research note on Monday, January 13th. Finally, Needham & Company LLC dropped their target price on shares of Cognex from $50.00 to $47.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research report on Friday, November 1st. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, five have issued a hold rating, six have issued a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $47.92.

About Cognex

Cognex Corporation provides machine vision products that capture and analyze visual information to automate manufacturing and distribution tasks worldwide. Its machine vision products are used to automate the manufacturing and tracking of discrete items, including mobile phones, electric vehicle batteries, and e-commerce packages by locating, identifying, inspecting, and measuring them during the manufacturing or distribution process.