EchoStar Sees Unusually High Options Volume (NASDAQ:SATS)

EchoStar Co. (NASDAQ:SATS) was the target of some unusual options trading on Friday. Traders acquired 14,240 call options on the stock. This is an increase of 620% compared to the average volume of 1,977 call options.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Several hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in the stock. Gordian Capital Singapore Pte Ltd bought a new position in EchoStar in the second quarter valued at about $89,000. Creative Planning boosted its position in shares of EchoStar by 44.7% in the second quarter. Creative Planning now owns 24,904 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock worth $444,000 after purchasing an additional 7,693 shares during the period. Algert Global LLC increased its stake in shares of EchoStar by 430.1% in the second quarter. Algert Global LLC now owns 86,147 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock worth $1,534,000 after purchasing an additional 69,897 shares in the last quarter. Scientech Research LLC bought a new stake in shares of EchoStar during the 2nd quarter valued at $265,000. Finally, The Manufacturers Life Insurance Company lifted its stake in shares of EchoStar by 3.2% during the 2nd quarter. The Manufacturers Life Insurance Company now owns 69,602 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock valued at $1,240,000 after buying an additional 2,176 shares in the last quarter. 33.62% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

EchoStar Stock Up 0.5 %

NASDAQ:SATS opened at $22.40 on Friday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.00, a quick ratio of 0.32 and a current ratio of 0.40. The firm has a market cap of $6.09 billion, a P/E ratio of -2.91 and a beta of 0.70. EchoStar has a fifty-two week low of $9.53 and a fifty-two week high of $23.05. The firm has a 50-day simple moving average of $18.96 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $16.83.

EchoStar (NASDAQ:SATS) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Friday, August 9th. The communications equipment provider reported ($0.76) earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of ($0.37) by ($0.39). The business had revenue of $3.95 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $3.98 billion. EchoStar had a negative net margin of 18.65% and a positive return on equity of 0.18%. The company’s revenue for the quarter was down 9.3% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the previous year, the company earned $0.39 earnings per share. Analysts predict that EchoStar will post -1.64 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Analyst Ratings Changes

SATS has been the topic of several recent research reports. UBS Group upped their price target on EchoStar from $14.00 to $15.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research note on Tuesday, August 13th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. reaffirmed an “underweight” rating and issued a $12.00 target price on shares of EchoStar in a research report on Monday, August 12th. StockNews.com raised shares of EchoStar to a “sell” rating in a research report on Tuesday, July 30th. Finally, TD Cowen cut their price objective on shares of EchoStar from $38.00 to $37.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a report on Monday, August 12th. Two investment analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, three have issued a hold rating, one has given a buy rating and one has issued a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, EchoStar presently has an average rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $22.00.

EchoStar Company Profile

EchoStar Corporation, together with its subsidiaries, provides networking technologies and services worldwide. The company operates in four segments: Pay-TV, Retail Wireless, 5G Network Deployment, Broadband and Satellite Services. The Pay-TV segment offers a direct broadcast and fixed satellite services; designs, develops, and distributes receiver system; and provides digital broadcast operations, including satellite uplinking/downlinking, transmission and, other services to third-party pay-TV providers; and multichannel, live-linear and on-demand streaming over-the-top internet-based domestic, international, Latino, and Freestream video programming services under the DISH and SLING brand names.