Needham & Company LLC Reaffirms “Buy” Rating for Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL)

Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL)‘s stock had its “buy” rating reaffirmed by equities researchers at Needham & Company LLC in a research report issued to clients and investors on Tuesday,Benzinga reports. They currently have a $260.00 price objective on the iPhone maker’s stock. Needham & Company LLC’s target price would suggest a potential upside of 16.16% from the company’s previous close.

Several other brokerages have also recently issued reports on AAPL. Bank of America reissued a “buy” rating and set a $256.00 price objective on shares of Apple in a research note on Friday, January 3rd. Wells Fargo & Company upped their price target on Apple to $275.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Monday, December 9th. KeyCorp lowered Apple from a “sector weight” rating to an “underweight” rating and set a $200.00 price objective on the stock. in a research note on Friday, October 25th. Barclays increased their target price on shares of Apple to $184.00 and gave the stock a “sell” rating in a research report on Friday, January 10th. Finally, Moffett Nathanson reaffirmed a “sell” rating and set a $188.00 price target (down from $202.00) on shares of Apple in a research report on Tuesday, January 7th. Four research analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, nine have given a hold rating, twenty-two have issued a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $237.99.

Apple Trading Up 0.5 %

Shares of Apple stock opened at $223.83 on Tuesday. The firm has a market cap of $3.37 trillion, a PE ratio of 36.81, a P/E/G ratio of 2.25 and a beta of 1.20. The business’s fifty day moving average is $241.09 and its two-hundred day moving average is $230.82. Apple has a fifty-two week low of $164.07 and a fifty-two week high of $260.10. The company has a quick ratio of 0.83, a current ratio of 0.87 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.51.

Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, October 31st. The iPhone maker reported $1.64 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.60 by $0.04. Apple had a net margin of 23.97% and a return on equity of 152.94%. The company had revenue of $94.93 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $94.52 billion. During the same quarter in the prior year, the company posted $1.46 EPS. The company’s quarterly revenue was up 6.1% compared to the same quarter last year. Analysts anticipate that Apple will post 7.43 earnings per share for the current year.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other news, COO Jeffrey E. Williams sold 100,000 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, December 16th. The shares were sold at an average price of $249.97, for a total value of $24,997,000.00. Following the transaction, the chief operating officer now directly owns 389,944 shares in the company, valued at approximately $97,474,301.68. This trade represents a 20.41 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through the SEC website. Also, insider Chris Kondo sold 4,130 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, November 18th. The shares were sold at an average price of $228.87, for a total transaction of $945,233.10. Following the sale, the insider now directly owns 15,419 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $3,528,946.53. This represents a 21.13 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. 0.06% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

Institutional Trading of Apple

Several hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in AAPL. Lantz Financial LLC grew its position in shares of Apple by 8.6% during the second quarter. Lantz Financial LLC now owns 29,751 shares of the iPhone maker’s stock worth $6,266,000 after acquiring an additional 2,361 shares during the last quarter. TFC Financial Management Inc. boosted its stake in Apple by 0.7% during the 2nd quarter. TFC Financial Management Inc. now owns 52,910 shares of the iPhone maker’s stock valued at $11,144,000 after purchasing an additional 377 shares during the period. Busey Bank grew its position in Apple by 0.8% in the 2nd quarter. Busey Bank now owns 1,025,702 shares of the iPhone maker’s stock worth $216,033,000 after purchasing an additional 7,805 shares during the last quarter. Iowa State Bank increased its stake in shares of Apple by 1.8% in the second quarter. Iowa State Bank now owns 83,106 shares of the iPhone maker’s stock valued at $17,504,000 after purchasing an additional 1,431 shares during the period. Finally, First Bancorp Inc ME raised its holdings in shares of Apple by 3.3% during the second quarter. First Bancorp Inc ME now owns 30,201 shares of the iPhone maker’s stock valued at $6,361,000 after buying an additional 956 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors own 67.73% of the company’s stock.

About Apple

Apple Inc designs, manufactures, and markets smartphones, personal computers, tablets, wearables, and accessories worldwide. The company offers iPhone, a line of smartphones; Mac, a line of personal computers; iPad, a line of multi-purpose tablets; and wearables, home, and accessories comprising AirPods, Apple TV, Apple Watch, Beats products, and HomePod.