AXT (NASDAQ:AXTI) Given Buy Rating at B. Riley

B. Riley restated their buy rating on shares of AXT (NASDAQ:AXTI) in a research report sent to investors on Friday morning,Benzinga reports. The brokerage currently has a $6.00 target price on the semiconductor company’s stock, up from their previous target price of $5.50.

AXTI has been the subject of a number of other research reports. Wedbush reaffirmed an “outperform” rating and issued a $5.50 target price on shares of AXT in a report on Friday, February 7th. Northland Securities lowered their price objective on AXT from $6.00 to $5.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a research note on Friday, November 1st. Finally, Needham & Company LLC reiterated a “buy” rating and set a $5.00 target price on shares of AXT in a research report on Friday. One analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating and five have issued a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $5.10.

AXT Price Performance

AXTI stock opened at $1.58 on Friday. The stock has a market cap of $70.71 million, a price-to-earnings ratio of -6.32 and a beta of 2.08. The company has a 50 day simple moving average of $2.17 and a 200 day simple moving average of $2.29. AXT has a 1 year low of $1.56 and a 1 year high of $5.64.

AXT (NASDAQ:AXTI) last posted its earnings results on Thursday, February 20th. The semiconductor company reported ($0.12) earnings per share for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of ($0.04) by ($0.08). AXT had a negative return on equity of 4.58% and a negative net margin of 10.73%. The company had revenue of $25.11 million for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $23.94 million. On average, equities research analysts anticipate that AXT will post -0.22 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On AXT

A number of institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in the stock. Pacific Ridge Capital Partners LLC raised its position in shares of AXT by 65.4% during the fourth quarter. Pacific Ridge Capital Partners LLC now owns 1,937,424 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock worth $4,204,000 after acquiring an additional 766,122 shares during the last quarter. Systematic Financial Management LP raised its holdings in AXT by 5.0% during the 4th quarter. Systematic Financial Management LP now owns 1,551,380 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock worth $3,366,000 after purchasing an additional 74,211 shares during the last quarter. Kennedy Capital Management LLC lifted its position in shares of AXT by 13.1% in the 4th quarter. Kennedy Capital Management LLC now owns 915,460 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock worth $1,987,000 after purchasing an additional 106,121 shares during the period. White Pine Capital LLC boosted its stake in shares of AXT by 0.8% in the 4th quarter. White Pine Capital LLC now owns 668,499 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock valued at $1,451,000 after purchasing an additional 5,246 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Connor Clark & Lunn Investment Management Ltd. increased its position in shares of AXT by 10.0% during the third quarter. Connor Clark & Lunn Investment Management Ltd. now owns 606,417 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock worth $1,468,000 after buying an additional 54,891 shares during the period. Institutional investors own 49.52% of the company’s stock.

AXT Company Profile

AXT, Inc designs, develops, manufactures, and distributes compound and single element semiconductor substrates. The company offers indium phosphide for use in data center connectivity using light/lasers, high-speed data transfer in data centers, 5G communications, fiber optic lasers and detectors, consumer devices, passive optical networks, silicon photonics, photonic integrated circuits, thermo-photovoltaics, RF amplifier and switching, infrared light-emitting diode (LEDS) motion control, lidar for robotics and autonomous vehicles, and infrared thermal imaging.