QuidelOrtho (NASDAQ:QDEL) Reaches New 1-Year Low – Time to Sell?

QuidelOrtho Co. (NASDAQ:QDEL)’s stock price hit a new 52-week low on Thursday . The company traded as low as $25.13 and last traded at $28.85, with a volume of 2219044 shares traded. The stock had previously closed at $26.20.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

QDEL has been the topic of a number of recent research reports. Citigroup raised shares of QuidelOrtho from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and upped their price target for the company from $44.00 to $50.00 in a research note on Wednesday, December 11th. Royal Bank of Canada dropped their target price on shares of QuidelOrtho from $64.00 to $61.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a report on Thursday, February 13th. StockNews.com cut shares of QuidelOrtho from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a report on Saturday, February 15th. Finally, UBS Group raised their price target on shares of QuidelOrtho from $43.00 to $45.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research report on Thursday, February 13th. Four equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and three have issued a buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat, the stock currently has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $51.20.

QuidelOrtho Price Performance

The stock has a market cap of $1.95 billion, a PE ratio of -0.95 and a beta of 0.43. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.71, a current ratio of 1.22 and a quick ratio of 0.69. The company has a 50-day simple moving average of $37.41 and a 200-day simple moving average of $40.39.

QuidelOrtho (NASDAQ:QDEL) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, February 12th. The company reported $0.63 EPS for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $1.07 by ($0.44). QuidelOrtho had a negative net margin of 72.84% and a positive return on equity of 3.78%. Sell-side analysts anticipate that QuidelOrtho Co. will post 2.3 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Institutional Trading of QuidelOrtho

Several institutional investors and hedge funds have recently bought and sold shares of QDEL. State Street Corp grew its stake in shares of QuidelOrtho by 16.9% in the 3rd quarter. State Street Corp now owns 1,907,898 shares of the company’s stock valued at $87,000,000 after buying an additional 275,522 shares in the last quarter. Merit Financial Group LLC acquired a new stake in shares of QuidelOrtho in the fourth quarter valued at about $301,000. Principal Financial Group Inc. grew its position in QuidelOrtho by 64.5% during the third quarter. Principal Financial Group Inc. now owns 272,037 shares of the company’s stock worth $12,405,000 after buying an additional 106,642 shares in the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC grew its position in QuidelOrtho by 1.8% during the third quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 920,703 shares of the company’s stock worth $41,996,000 after buying an additional 16,059 shares in the last quarter. Finally, State of New Jersey Common Pension Fund D grew its position in QuidelOrtho by 22.4% during the fourth quarter. State of New Jersey Common Pension Fund D now owns 54,411 shares of the company’s stock worth $2,424,000 after buying an additional 9,956 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 99.00% of the company’s stock.

QuidelOrtho Company Profile

QuidelOrtho Corporation provides diagnostic testing solutions. The company operates through Labs, Transfusion Medicine, Point-of-Care, and Molecular Diagnostics business units. The Labs business unit provides clinical chemistry laboratory instruments and tests that measure target chemicals in bodily fluids for the evaluation of health and the clinical management of patients; immunoassay laboratory instruments and tests, which measure proteins as they act as antigens in the spread of disease, antibodies in the immune response spurred by disease, or markers of proper organ function and health; testing products to detect and monitor disease progression across a spectrum of therapeutic areas; and specialized diagnostic solutions.