MeridianLink, Inc. (NYSE:MLNK) Given Consensus Recommendation of “Hold” by Brokerages

MeridianLink, Inc. (NYSE:MLNK) has been assigned a consensus recommendation of “Hold” from the eight analysts that are currently covering the stock, Marketbeat reports. Two investment analysts have rated the stock with a sell recommendation, four have assigned a hold recommendation and two have assigned a buy recommendation to the company. The average 1-year target price among brokerages that have covered the stock in the last year is $22.08.

A number of analysts recently weighed in on the stock. Bank of America lowered shares of MeridianLink from a “buy” rating to an “underperform” rating and lowered their price objective for the stock from $28.00 to $18.00 in a research note on Thursday, January 30th. UBS Group upgraded shares of MeridianLink from a “sell” rating to a “neutral” rating and increased their price objective for the company from $18.00 to $22.50 in a research note on Monday, November 11th. Finally, Raymond James boosted their price objective on shares of MeridianLink from $26.00 to $28.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research note on Friday, November 8th.

MeridianLink Stock Performance

MeridianLink stock opened at $19.21 on Friday. MeridianLink has a fifty-two week low of $16.49 and a fifty-two week high of $25.33. The company has a market capitalization of $1.45 billion, a PE ratio of -28.67 and a beta of 1.00. The company has a 50 day moving average price of $20.99 and a 200-day moving average price of $21.89. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.11, a quick ratio of 1.86 and a current ratio of 1.86.

MeridianLink (NYSE:MLNK) last issued its earnings results on Thursday, November 7th. The company reported ($0.08) earnings per share for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $0.09 by ($0.17). MeridianLink had a negative return on equity of 9.57% and a negative net margin of 16.57%. The firm had revenue of $80.37 million during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $79.54 million. As a group, equities analysts forecast that MeridianLink will post -0.35 earnings per share for the current year.

Insider Buying and Selling

In related news, CEO Nicolaas Vlok sold 29,217 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, December 12th. The shares were sold at an average price of $22.80, for a total value of $666,147.60. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer now directly owns 1,043,382 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $23,789,109.60. This trade represents a 2.72 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available through this hyperlink. Also, major shareholder Timothy Nguyen sold 10,776 shares of MeridianLink stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, November 25th. The stock was sold at an average price of $23.02, for a total transaction of $248,063.52. Following the completion of the sale, the insider now owns 10,751,935 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $247,509,543.70. This trade represents a 0.10 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold a total of 286,488 shares of company stock worth $6,525,738 in the last 90 days. 21.30% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in the stock. WCM Investment Management LLC raised its position in MeridianLink by 1.0% during the 3rd quarter. WCM Investment Management LLC now owns 1,159,590 shares of the company’s stock worth $24,340,000 after buying an additional 12,002 shares during the last quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP increased its stake in shares of MeridianLink by 23.3% in the second quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP now owns 797,074 shares of the company’s stock worth $17,026,000 after acquiring an additional 150,712 shares during the period. State Street Corp raised its holdings in shares of MeridianLink by 20.7% during the third quarter. State Street Corp now owns 667,201 shares of the company’s stock worth $13,724,000 after purchasing an additional 114,578 shares during the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC lifted its position in MeridianLink by 12.2% during the third quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 603,443 shares of the company’s stock valued at $12,415,000 after purchasing an additional 65,834 shares during the period. Finally, Polar Asset Management Partners Inc. purchased a new stake in MeridianLink in the third quarter valued at $8,598,000. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 82.65% of the company’s stock.

MeridianLink Company Profile

MeridianLink, Inc, a software and services company, provides software solutions for banks, credit unions, mortgage lenders, specialty lending providers, and consumer reporting agencies in the United States. The company offers MeridianLink One, a multi-product platform that can be tailored to meet the needs of customers as they digitally transform their organizations and adapt to changing business and consumer demands; MeridianLink Portal, a Point of Sale system that allows financial institutions to expand existing lending and deposit account; MeridianLink Opening, a cloud-based online account opening and deposit software solution; MeridianLink Consumer, a full loan solution suite to banks and credit unions; and MeridianLink DecisionLender, a loan origination software (LOS) for finance companies.