HP Inc. (NYSE:HPQ) Short Interest Down 5.5% in October

HP Inc. (NYSE:HPQ) saw a large decrease in short interest in October. As of October 15th, there was short interest totalling 42,820,000 shares, a decrease of 5.5% from the September 30th total of 45,310,000 shares. Approximately 4.5% of the shares of the stock are short sold. Based on an average trading volume of 7,500,000 shares, the short-interest ratio is presently 5.7 days.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

Several equities research analysts have issued reports on HPQ shares. UBS Group increased their price target on HP from $34.00 to $37.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a report on Thursday, August 29th. Citigroup cut shares of HP from a “buy” rating to a “neutral” rating and set a $37.00 price target on the stock. in a report on Tuesday, October 1st. Barclays lowered their price target on shares of HP from $33.00 to $32.00 and set an “equal weight” rating for the company in a research note on Thursday, August 29th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. raised their price target on HP from $38.00 to $42.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a report on Friday, August 23rd. Finally, Morgan Stanley cut their price target on HP from $37.00 to $36.00 and set an “equal weight” rating for the company in a report on Thursday, August 29th. One analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, seven have given a hold rating and five have assigned a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $35.55.

Insider Activity at HP

In other HP news, CEO Enrique Lores sold 211,501 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Thursday, September 12th. The shares were sold at an average price of $33.16, for a total transaction of $7,013,373.16. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer now directly owns 3 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $99.48. This trade represents a 0.00 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available at the SEC website. 0.41% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

Institutional Trading of HP

Several institutional investors have recently bought and sold shares of HPQ. Triad Wealth Partners LLC acquired a new position in shares of HP during the second quarter valued at approximately $33,000. Thurston Springer Miller Herd & Titak Inc. purchased a new stake in shares of HP in the second quarter valued at approximately $34,000. Wolff Wiese Magana LLC increased its holdings in shares of HP by 115.1% in the third quarter. Wolff Wiese Magana LLC now owns 968 shares of the computer maker’s stock valued at $35,000 after purchasing an additional 518 shares during the last quarter. ORG Wealth Partners LLC purchased a new stake in HP in the 3rd quarter valued at $37,000. Finally, DecisionPoint Financial LLC acquired a new stake in shares of HP in the 2nd quarter worth $43,000. 77.53% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

HP Price Performance

NYSE HPQ traded down $0.94 during trading on Thursday, reaching $35.60. 2,706,517 shares of the company’s stock traded hands, compared to its average volume of 7,771,523. The company’s 50 day simple moving average is $35.63 and its two-hundred day simple moving average is $34.29. HP has a 12-month low of $25.95 and a 12-month high of $39.52. The firm has a market cap of $34.84 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 12.34, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.64 and a beta of 1.07.

HP (NYSE:HPQ) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, August 28th. The computer maker reported $0.83 EPS for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $0.86 by ($0.03). The company had revenue of $13.52 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $13.37 billion. HP had a net margin of 5.33% and a negative return on equity of 266.37%. The business’s revenue for the quarter was up 2.4% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the previous year, the business earned $0.86 earnings per share. Research analysts expect that HP will post 3.39 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

HP announced that its board has approved a stock repurchase program on Wednesday, August 28th that authorizes the company to buyback $10.00 billion in outstanding shares. This buyback authorization authorizes the computer maker to purchase up to 28.9% of its shares through open market purchases. Shares buyback programs are usually an indication that the company’s leadership believes its shares are undervalued.

HP Company Profile

HP Inc provides products, technologies, software, solutions, and services to individual consumers, small- and medium-sized businesses, and large enterprises, including customers in the government, health, and education sectors worldwide. It operates through Personal Systems and Printing segments. The Personal Systems segment offers commercial personal computers (PCs), consumer PCs, workstations, thin clients, commercial tablets and mobility devices, retail point-of-sale systems, displays and other related accessories, software, support, and services for the commercial and consumer markets.