BlackBerry (NYSE:BB) Stock Price Expected to Rise, Royal Bank of Canada Analyst Says

BlackBerry (NYSE:BB) had its price objective raised by Royal Bank of Canada from $3.25 to $4.00 in a research note published on Friday, MarketBeat.com reports. Royal Bank of Canada currently has a sector perform rating on the stock.

BB has been the subject of a number of other reports. Robert W. Baird upped their price objective on shares of BlackBerry from $3.00 to $3.50 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a report on Friday, December 20th. Canaccord Genuity Group upped their price target on BlackBerry from $2.80 to $3.00 and gave the stock a “hold” rating in a research note on Friday, December 20th. StockNews.com raised BlackBerry from a “sell” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Monday, December 9th. TD Securities upgraded BlackBerry from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating and boosted their target price for the stock from $3.25 to $4.00 in a report on Friday, December 20th. Finally, CIBC lifted their price target on shares of BlackBerry from $3.50 to $3.60 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research report on Thursday, October 17th. Six investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, three have issued a buy rating and one has issued a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $3.69.

BlackBerry Stock Performance

Shares of BB stock opened at $4.05 on Friday. BlackBerry has a fifty-two week low of $2.01 and a fifty-two week high of $4.35. The stock’s 50-day moving average is $2.96 and its two-hundred day moving average is $2.59. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.27, a current ratio of 1.44 and a quick ratio of 1.44. The firm has a market cap of $2.40 billion, a P/E ratio of -16.20 and a beta of 1.30.

BlackBerry (NYSE:BB) last released its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, December 19th. The company reported $0.02 EPS for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of ($0.01) by $0.03. The firm had revenue of $143.00 million for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $144.84 million. BlackBerry had a negative return on equity of 3.38% and a negative net margin of 21.66%. The firm’s revenue was down 5.9% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the prior year, the company posted $0.01 earnings per share. Analysts predict that BlackBerry will post -0.06 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Insider Activity

In other BlackBerry news, CEO John Joseph Giamatteo sold 155,815 shares of the stock in a transaction on Thursday, January 2nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $3.68, for a total transaction of $573,399.20. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer now directly owns 385,552 shares in the company, valued at $1,418,831.36. This represents a 28.78 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through this link. Also, insider Mattias Eriksson sold 12,680 shares of BlackBerry stock in a transaction dated Monday, January 6th. The shares were sold at an average price of $4.00, for a total transaction of $50,720.00. Following the transaction, the insider now directly owns 278,306 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $1,113,224. This represents a 4.36 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last 90 days, insiders sold 219,796 shares of company stock worth $823,314. 0.34% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On BlackBerry

Several hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the stock. Barclays PLC grew its stake in shares of BlackBerry by 60.2% during the third quarter. Barclays PLC now owns 249,218 shares of the company’s stock valued at $652,000 after purchasing an additional 93,651 shares during the last quarter. Toronto Dominion Bank boosted its position in BlackBerry by 5.3% in the 3rd quarter. Toronto Dominion Bank now owns 718,314 shares of the company’s stock valued at $1,882,000 after buying an additional 36,372 shares during the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC increased its stake in shares of BlackBerry by 2.9% in the 3rd quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 267,073 shares of the company’s stock valued at $706,000 after buying an additional 7,652 shares during the period. Public Employees Retirement System of Ohio bought a new stake in shares of BlackBerry during the third quarter worth $410,000. Finally, Orion Portfolio Solutions LLC lifted its stake in shares of BlackBerry by 121.1% during the third quarter. Orion Portfolio Solutions LLC now owns 37,916 shares of the company’s stock valued at $99,000 after acquiring an additional 20,771 shares during the period. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 54.48% of the company’s stock.

BlackBerry Company Profile

BlackBerry Limited provides intelligent security software and services to enterprises and governments worldwide. The company operates through three segments: Cybersecurity, IoT, and Licensing and Other. The company offers CylanceENDPOINT, an integrated endpoint security solution; CylanceGUARD, a managed detection and response solution; CylanceEDGE, an AI-powered continuous authentication zero trust network access solution; CylanceINTELLIGENCE, a contextual cyber threat intelligence service; BlackBerry Dynamics offers a development platform and secure container for mobile applications; BlackBerry Workspaces a secure Enterprise File Sync and Share (EFSS) solution; BlackBerry Messenger (BBM) Enterprise, an enterprise-grade secure instant messaging solution for messaging, voice and video; BlackBerry SecuSUITE is a certified, multi-OS voice and text messaging solution; BlackBerry AtHoc, a secure networked critical event management solution; and BlackBerry unified endpoint management (UEM) solutions.