Trexquant Investment LP Grows Stake in Appian Co. (NASDAQ:APPN)

Trexquant Investment LP boosted its position in shares of Appian Co. (NASDAQ:APPN) by 10.8% during the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the SEC. The institutional investor owned 166,303 shares of the company’s stock after purchasing an additional 16,164 shares during the quarter. Trexquant Investment LP owned approximately 0.19% of Appian worth $5,485,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Several other large investors also recently bought and sold shares of the company. KLP Kapitalforvaltning AS purchased a new stake in shares of Appian in the 4th quarter worth about $181,000. FMR LLC lifted its holdings in shares of Appian by 199.4% in the third quarter. FMR LLC now owns 5,935 shares of the company’s stock valued at $203,000 after purchasing an additional 3,953 shares in the last quarter. Entropy Technologies LP acquired a new stake in shares of Appian in the fourth quarter valued at approximately $208,000. Magnetar Financial LLC purchased a new position in shares of Appian during the 4th quarter worth approximately $249,000. Finally, Summit Global Investments acquired a new position in shares of Appian during the 4th quarter worth approximately $256,000. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 52.70% of the company’s stock.

Appian Trading Down 5.5 %

Shares of NASDAQ:APPN opened at $26.40 on Friday. Appian Co. has a 12-month low of $25.77 and a 12-month high of $43.33. The stock’s 50-day moving average price is $32.07 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $34.06. The firm has a market cap of $1.95 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of -20.95 and a beta of 1.78.

Appian (NASDAQ:APPN) last released its earnings results on Wednesday, February 19th. The company reported ($0.12) earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of ($0.01) by ($0.11). The company had revenue of $166.70 million during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $164.31 million. Appian had a negative net margin of 14.95% and a negative return on equity of 532.05%. Appian’s revenue for the quarter was up 14.7% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm posted $0.06 earnings per share. As a group, research analysts forecast that Appian Co. will post -0.28 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, Director Albert G.W. Biddle III sold 990 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, February 24th. The stock was sold at an average price of $33.21, for a total value of $32,877.90. Following the completion of the sale, the director now owns 29,348 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $974,647.08. This represents a 3.26 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this hyperlink. Also, major shareholder Abdiel Capital Advisors, Lp sold 57,975 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, April 2nd. The shares were sold at an average price of $29.52, for a total value of $1,711,422.00. Following the sale, the insider now owns 10,121,563 shares in the company, valued at approximately $298,788,539.76. The trade was a 0.57 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold 137,493 shares of company stock worth $3,824,507 over the last three months. 44.00% of the stock is owned by insiders.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several research firms have weighed in on APPN. Barclays raised their price target on Appian from $34.00 to $37.00 and gave the stock an “underweight” rating in a research report on Friday, December 6th. KeyCorp reiterated a “sector weight” rating on shares of Appian in a research report on Tuesday, January 14th. Finally, Scotiabank began coverage on shares of Appian in a report on Monday, January 6th. They issued a “sector perform” rating and a $37.00 target price on the stock. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, four have issued a hold rating and one has assigned a buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, the company presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $37.80.

About Appian

Appian Corporation, a software company that provides low-code design platform in the United States, Mexico, Portugal, and internationally. The company's platform offers artificial intelligence, process automation, data fabric, and process mining. It provides The Appian Platform, an integrated automation platform that enables organizations to design, automate, and optimize mission-critical business processes.