Wedbush Reiterates Outperform Rating for BJ’s Restaurants (NASDAQ:BJRI)

BJ’s Restaurants (NASDAQ:BJRI)‘s stock had its “outperform” rating reissued by stock analysts at Wedbush in a research note issued on Thursday, Benzinga reports. They currently have a $43.00 price objective on the restaurant operator’s stock. Wedbush’s price objective points to a potential upside of 40.39% from the company’s current price.

A number of other analysts have also weighed in on BJRI. Barclays dropped their price objective on BJ’s Restaurants from $36.00 to $35.00 and set an “underweight” rating for the company in a research note on Friday, July 26th. Benchmark lowered BJ’s Restaurants from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Friday, July 26th. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, five have given a hold rating and two have assigned a buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $38.63.

BJ’s Restaurants Stock Performance

Shares of BJRI opened at $30.63 on Thursday. The stock has a 50-day moving average price of $33.06 and a 200-day moving average price of $34.12. The company has a market cap of $716.22 million, a PE ratio of 30.63, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.55 and a beta of 2.13. BJ’s Restaurants has a 12-month low of $21.64 and a 12-month high of $38.87. The company has a current ratio of 0.03, a quick ratio of 0.28 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.16.

BJ’s Restaurants (NASDAQ:BJRI) last released its earnings results on Thursday, July 25th. The restaurant operator reported $0.72 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.51 by $0.21. The company had revenue of $349.93 million during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $349.18 million. BJ’s Restaurants had a return on equity of 7.83% and a net margin of 2.19%. BJ’s Restaurants’s quarterly revenue was up .1% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the previous year, the company posted $0.50 EPS. As a group, equities analysts forecast that BJ’s Restaurants will post 1.41 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On BJ’s Restaurants

Several institutional investors and hedge funds have recently modified their holdings of BJRI. Meeder Asset Management Inc. bought a new position in shares of BJ’s Restaurants during the second quarter valued at $40,000. EntryPoint Capital LLC purchased a new stake in shares of BJ’s Restaurants during the first quarter valued at $45,000. Quadrant Capital Group LLC boosted its position in shares of BJ’s Restaurants by 141.0% during the fourth quarter. Quadrant Capital Group LLC now owns 1,270 shares of the restaurant operator’s stock valued at $46,000 after buying an additional 743 shares during the last quarter. 1620 Investment Advisors Inc. purchased a new stake in shares of BJ’s Restaurants during the second quarter valued at $57,000. Finally, Headlands Technologies LLC boosted its position in shares of BJ’s Restaurants by 247.8% during the second quarter. Headlands Technologies LLC now owns 1,864 shares of the restaurant operator’s stock valued at $65,000 after buying an additional 1,328 shares during the last quarter. 99.95% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

BJ’s Restaurants Company Profile

BJ's Restaurants, Inc owns and operates casual dining restaurants in the United States. Its restaurants offer pizzas, craft and other beers, appetizers, entrées, pastas, sandwiches, specialty salads, and desserts. The company was formerly known as Chicago Pizza & Brewery, Inc and changed its name to BJ's Restaurants, Inc in August 2004.