Insider Selling: Veeco Instruments Inc. (NASDAQ:VECO) CFO Sells 2,500 Shares of Stock

Veeco Instruments Inc. (NASDAQ:VECO) CFO John P. Kiernan sold 2,500 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, January 10th. The shares were sold at an average price of $27.63, for a total value of $69,075.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief financial officer now directly owns 75,142 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $2,076,173.46. The trade was a 3.22 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available at this hyperlink.

Veeco Instruments Trading Up 2.0 %

Shares of NASDAQ:VECO opened at $26.78 on Thursday. The company’s 50-day moving average price is $27.67 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $32.88. Veeco Instruments Inc. has a one year low of $25.52 and a one year high of $49.25. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.33, a current ratio of 3.54 and a quick ratio of 2.41. The stock has a market capitalization of $1.52 billion, a PE ratio of 19.84 and a beta of 1.15.

Veeco Instruments (NASDAQ:VECO) last released its earnings results on Wednesday, November 6th. The semiconductor company reported $0.46 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.45 by $0.01. Veeco Instruments had a return on equity of 10.92% and a net margin of 11.34%. The business had revenue of $184.80 million for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $180.57 million. During the same quarter in the prior year, the company posted $0.41 earnings per share. Veeco Instruments’s revenue was up 4.2% on a year-over-year basis. On average, equities analysts forecast that Veeco Instruments Inc. will post 1.12 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Veeco Instruments

Large investors have recently made changes to their positions in the stock. Wasatch Advisors LP increased its holdings in Veeco Instruments by 50.3% during the third quarter. Wasatch Advisors LP now owns 2,640,649 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock worth $87,485,000 after buying an additional 883,815 shares during the last quarter. The Manufacturers Life Insurance Company grew its position in shares of Veeco Instruments by 20.1% in the 3rd quarter. The Manufacturers Life Insurance Company now owns 2,216,351 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock valued at $73,428,000 after acquiring an additional 371,221 shares during the period. State Street Corp increased its stake in shares of Veeco Instruments by 1.5% during the 3rd quarter. State Street Corp now owns 2,091,995 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock worth $69,308,000 after purchasing an additional 30,008 shares during the last quarter. Driehaus Capital Management LLC raised its holdings in shares of Veeco Instruments by 119.3% in the 2nd quarter. Driehaus Capital Management LLC now owns 1,458,288 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock valued at $68,117,000 after purchasing an additional 793,429 shares during the period. Finally, Geode Capital Management LLC lifted its stake in Veeco Instruments by 1.7% in the 3rd quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 1,337,321 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock valued at $44,314,000 after purchasing an additional 22,850 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 98.46% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Ratings Changes

VECO has been the topic of several recent analyst reports. The Goldman Sachs Group decreased their price objective on Veeco Instruments from $35.00 to $30.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a research report on Thursday, November 7th. Oppenheimer reduced their price target on shares of Veeco Instruments from $45.00 to $40.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a report on Thursday, November 7th. Benchmark dropped their price objective on shares of Veeco Instruments from $42.00 to $38.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a report on Thursday, November 7th. StockNews.com raised shares of Veeco Instruments from a “sell” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Friday, December 6th. Finally, Citigroup upgraded Veeco Instruments from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and set a $33.00 target price for the company in a report on Monday, January 6th. Three research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and five have issued a buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, Veeco Instruments presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $39.71.

About Veeco Instruments

Veeco Instruments Inc, together with its subsidiaries, develops, manufactures, sells, and supports semiconductor and thin film process equipment primarily to make electronic devices in the United States, Europe, the Middle East, and Africa, China, Rest of the Asia-Pacific, and internationally. The company offers laser annealing, ion beam deposition and etch, metal organic chemical vapor deposition, single wafer wet processing and surface preparation, molecular beam epitaxy, advanced packaging lithography, atomic layer deposition, and other deposition systems.