M&G Plc Buys Shares of 4,737 MercadoLibre, Inc. (NASDAQ:MELI)

M&G Plc bought a new position in shares of MercadoLibre, Inc. (NASDAQ:MELI) during the third quarter, Holdings Channel reports. The institutional investor bought 4,737 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $9,720,000.

Other large investors also recently modified their holdings of the company. Norden Group LLC bought a new position in MercadoLibre in the first quarter worth about $293,000. Private Advisor Group LLC grew its stake in MercadoLibre by 4.5% during the 1st quarter. Private Advisor Group LLC now owns 554 shares of the company’s stock worth $838,000 after buying an additional 24 shares during the last quarter. Duality Advisers LP increased its position in MercadoLibre by 9.1% in the first quarter. Duality Advisers LP now owns 1,418 shares of the company’s stock worth $2,144,000 after buying an additional 118 shares during the period. SG Americas Securities LLC lifted its stake in MercadoLibre by 446.9% in the first quarter. SG Americas Securities LLC now owns 10,336 shares of the company’s stock valued at $15,628,000 after buying an additional 8,446 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Empirical Financial Services LLC d.b.a. Empirical Wealth Management boosted its holdings in shares of MercadoLibre by 2.5% during the first quarter. Empirical Financial Services LLC d.b.a. Empirical Wealth Management now owns 418 shares of the company’s stock valued at $632,000 after acquiring an additional 10 shares during the period. 87.62% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several brokerages recently weighed in on MELI. Barclays lifted their price objective on shares of MercadoLibre from $2,100.00 to $2,500.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research report on Wednesday, October 2nd. Bank of America boosted their price objective on MercadoLibre from $2,250.00 to $2,500.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research report on Thursday, September 12th. The Goldman Sachs Group lifted their target price on MercadoLibre from $2,180.00 to $2,480.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Thursday, August 8th. Morgan Stanley increased their price target on MercadoLibre from $2,175.00 to $2,500.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Friday, September 20th. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. cut shares of MercadoLibre from an “overweight” rating to a “neutral” rating and set a $2,400.00 price objective on the stock. in a research note on Wednesday, October 2nd. Three analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, fourteen have issued a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the stock currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $2,309.67.

MercadoLibre Trading Down 16.2 %

MercadoLibre stock opened at $1,774.05 on Friday. The firm has a market cap of $89.94 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 64.11, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.26 and a beta of 1.61. MercadoLibre, Inc. has a 1 year low of $1,324.99 and a 1 year high of $2,161.73. The firm’s 50 day moving average price is $2,055.08 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $1,819.36. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.67, a quick ratio of 1.26 and a current ratio of 1.28.

MercadoLibre (NASDAQ:MELI) last announced its earnings results on Wednesday, November 6th. The company reported $7.83 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of $11.27 by ($3.44). MercadoLibre had a return on equity of 43.52% and a net margin of 8.03%. The company had revenue of $5.31 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $5.25 billion. On average, research analysts predict that MercadoLibre, Inc. will post 37.7 EPS for the current fiscal year.

About MercadoLibre

MercadoLibre, Inc operates online commerce platforms in the United States. It operates Mercado Libre Marketplace, an automated online commerce platform that enables businesses, merchants, and individuals to list merchandise and conduct sales and purchases digitally; and Mercado Pago FinTech platform, a financial technology solution platform, which facilitates transactions on and off its marketplaces by providing a mechanism that allows its users to send and receive payments online, as well as allows users to transfer money through their websites or on the apps.