Priority Technology Holdings, Inc. (NASDAQ:PRTH) Sees Significant Drop in Short Interest

Priority Technology Holdings, Inc. (NASDAQ:PRTH) was the recipient of a large drop in short interest in January. As of January 31st, there was short interest totalling 411,300 shares, a drop of 28.4% from the January 15th total of 574,200 shares. Based on an average daily volume of 512,900 shares, the days-to-cover ratio is currently 0.8 days. Currently, 1.7% of the company’s shares are short sold.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of equities research analysts have issued reports on the company. Lake Street Capital upped their target price on Priority Technology from $8.00 to $13.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research report on Friday, November 22nd. B. Riley upped their price target on Priority Technology from $13.00 to $16.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Monday, November 25th. Finally, Keefe, Bruyette & Woods upgraded Priority Technology from a “market perform” rating to an “outperform” rating and upped their price target for the stock from $10.00 to $14.00 in a report on Thursday, January 16th.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other Priority Technology news, Director John Vito Priore sold 1,242,856 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, January 21st. The stock was sold at an average price of $7.44, for a total transaction of $9,246,848.64. Following the completion of the sale, the director now owns 4,071,574 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $30,292,510.56. This represents a 23.39 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through the SEC website. Also, insider Sean Kiewiet sold 22,178 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, November 26th. The stock was sold at an average price of $10.01, for a total value of $222,001.78. Following the sale, the insider now directly owns 1,009,675 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $10,106,846.75. The trade was a 2.15 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last quarter, insiders have sold 5,343,646 shares of company stock valued at $40,419,456. 76.30% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

A number of large investors have recently modified their holdings of PRTH. National Bank of Canada FI acquired a new position in shares of Priority Technology in the fourth quarter valued at $56,000. Virtu Financial LLC acquired a new position in shares of Priority Technology in the third quarter valued at $91,000. SG Americas Securities LLC bought a new stake in Priority Technology in the fourth quarter valued at $100,000. Wells Fargo & Company MN grew its position in Priority Technology by 53.8% in the fourth quarter. Wells Fargo & Company MN now owns 8,593 shares of the company’s stock valued at $101,000 after acquiring an additional 3,006 shares during the period. Finally, BNP Paribas Financial Markets grew its position in Priority Technology by 61.7% in the third quarter. BNP Paribas Financial Markets now owns 15,983 shares of the company’s stock valued at $109,000 after acquiring an additional 6,096 shares during the period. 11.52% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Priority Technology Price Performance

Shares of NASDAQ PRTH traded up $0.30 during trading hours on Friday, reaching $11.43. The stock had a trading volume of 350,440 shares, compared to its average volume of 820,314. The business’s fifty day moving average is $10.11 and its two-hundred day moving average is $7.76. The company has a market cap of $882.40 million, a price-to-earnings ratio of -27.21 and a beta of 1.17. Priority Technology has a twelve month low of $2.82 and a twelve month high of $12.44.

About Priority Technology

Priority Technology Holdings, Inc operates as a payment technology company in the United States. The company operates through three segments: Small and Medium-Sized Businesses (SMB) Payments, Business-To-Business (B2B) Payments, and Enterprise Payments. It offers SMB payments processing solutions for B2C transactions through independent sales organizations, financial institutions, independent software vendors, and other referral partners through its MX product suite, which includes MX Connect and MX Merchant products, such as MX Insights, MX Storefront, MX Retail, MX Invoice, MX B2B and ACH.com, and others, which provides flexible and customizable set of business applications that helps to manage critical business work functions and revenue performance to resellers and merchant clients using core payment processing.