Verdence Capital Advisors LLC Purchases New Position in Astera Labs, Inc. (NASDAQ:ALAB)

Verdence Capital Advisors LLC acquired a new position in shares of Astera Labs, Inc. (NASDAQ:ALAB) during the 4th quarter, Holdings Channel.com reports. The firm acquired 2,304 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $305,000.

A number of other institutional investors and hedge funds have also bought and sold shares of the company. Fred Alger Management LLC grew its position in shares of Astera Labs by 1,361.0% during the 3rd quarter. Fred Alger Management LLC now owns 2,821,921 shares of the company’s stock worth $147,840,000 after buying an additional 2,628,765 shares in the last quarter. Jennison Associates LLC purchased a new stake in Astera Labs in the fourth quarter worth about $229,991,000. Westfield Capital Management Co. LP bought a new position in Astera Labs during the 3rd quarter worth about $52,049,000. The Manufacturers Life Insurance Company increased its position in Astera Labs by 15,477.8% during the 3rd quarter. The Manufacturers Life Insurance Company now owns 879,055 shares of the company’s stock valued at $46,054,000 after purchasing an additional 873,412 shares during the period. Finally, Spyglass Capital Management LLC bought a new stake in shares of Astera Labs in the 3rd quarter valued at about $38,565,000. 60.47% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

A number of research firms have recently issued reports on ALAB. Needham & Company LLC reiterated a “buy” rating and set a $140.00 price objective on shares of Astera Labs in a research note on Tuesday, February 11th. Northland Securities raised Astera Labs from a “market perform” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $120.00 target price on the stock in a research report on Tuesday, January 28th. Stifel Nicolaus lifted their price target on Astera Labs from $100.00 to $150.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Monday, January 6th. Northland Capmk upgraded Astera Labs from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research note on Tuesday, January 28th. Finally, Morgan Stanley dropped their price objective on Astera Labs from $142.00 to $114.00 and set an “equal weight” rating on the stock in a research report on Tuesday, January 28th. One analyst has rated the stock with a hold rating, eleven have given a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has an average rating of “Buy” and an average price target of $115.33.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other news, CFO Michael Truett Tate sold 125,800 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, February 26th. The stock was sold at an average price of $82.53, for a total value of $10,382,274.00. Following the sale, the chief financial officer now owns 244,242 shares in the company, valued at $20,157,292.26. This represents a 34.00 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through the SEC website. Also, CEO Jitendra Mohan sold 350,680 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, February 19th. The stock was sold at an average price of $89.51, for a total value of $31,389,366.80. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 2,353,655 shares in the company, valued at approximately $210,675,659.05. This represents a 12.97 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold a total of 570,990 shares of company stock valued at $50,242,702 over the last 90 days.

Astera Labs Stock Performance

Shares of ALAB stock opened at $66.92 on Friday. Astera Labs, Inc. has a fifty-two week low of $36.22 and a fifty-two week high of $147.39. The firm has a market capitalization of $10.85 billion and a PE ratio of -38.68. The stock’s 50-day simple moving average is $104.47 and its 200-day simple moving average is $87.11.

Astera Labs (NASDAQ:ALAB) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Monday, February 10th. The company reported $0.10 earnings per share for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $0.26 by ($0.16). Astera Labs had a negative return on equity of 10.40% and a negative net margin of 21.05%. Sell-side analysts forecast that Astera Labs, Inc. will post 0.34 earnings per share for the current year.

About Astera Labs

Astera Labs, Inc designs, manufactures, and sells semiconductor-based connectivity solutions for cloud and AI infrastructure. Its Intelligent Connectivity Platform is comprised of a portfolio of data, network, and memory connectivity products, which are built on a unifying software-defined architecture that enables customers to deploy and operate high performance cloud and AI infrastructure at scale.