BlackBerry (NYSE:BB) Shares Up 7% – Still a Buy?

BlackBerry Limited (NYSE:BB)’s share price was up 7% during mid-day trading on Tuesday . The stock traded as high as $4.38 and last traded at $4.38. Approximately 13,983,184 shares traded hands during mid-day trading, a decline of 24% from the average daily volume of 18,352,430 shares. The stock had previously closed at $4.09.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several brokerages recently commented on BB. StockNews.com raised shares of BlackBerry from a “sell” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Monday, December 9th. Royal Bank of Canada upped their price objective on shares of BlackBerry from $3.25 to $4.00 and gave the company a “sector perform” rating in a research note on Friday, January 10th. CIBC raised their target price on BlackBerry from $3.50 to $3.60 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research note on Thursday, October 17th. TD Cowen upgraded shares of BlackBerry from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating and upped their price objective for the stock from $3.25 to $4.00 in a report on Friday, December 20th. Finally, Canaccord Genuity Group boosted their price target on shares of BlackBerry from $2.80 to $3.00 and gave the company a “hold” rating in a research report on Friday, December 20th. Six investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, three have issued a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $3.69.

BlackBerry Price Performance

The firm’s 50 day moving average is $3.41 and its 200 day moving average is $2.75. The firm has a market cap of $2.57 billion, a P/E ratio of -19.75 and a beta of 1.30. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.27, a current ratio of 1.37 and a quick ratio of 1.37.

BlackBerry (NYSE:BB) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, December 19th. The company reported $0.02 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of ($0.01) by $0.03. The company 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 2.02% and a negative net margin of 21.16%. The firm’s quarterly revenue was down 5.9% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the prior year, the business posted $0.01 EPS. As a group, analysts anticipate that BlackBerry Limited will post -0.03 earnings per share for the current year.

Insider Activity

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

Hedge Funds Weigh In On BlackBerry

A number of institutional investors and hedge funds have recently modified their holdings of the company. EP Wealth Advisors LLC purchased a new stake in shares of BlackBerry in the 2nd quarter worth $28,000. Northwestern Mutual Wealth Management Co. increased its position in BlackBerry by 83.3% in the second quarter. Northwestern Mutual Wealth Management Co. now owns 11,769 shares of the company’s stock worth $29,000 after buying an additional 5,349 shares in the last quarter. Quantinno Capital Management LP bought a new position in shares of BlackBerry in the third quarter worth about $38,000. Masso Torrence Wealth Management Inc. purchased a new position in shares of BlackBerry during the 4th quarter valued at about $38,000. Finally, Signaturefd LLC grew its stake in shares of BlackBerry by 65.5% during the 3rd quarter. Signaturefd LLC now owns 22,898 shares of the company’s stock valued at $60,000 after acquiring an additional 9,063 shares during the period. 54.48% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

About BlackBerry

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.