Shift4 Payments’ (FOUR) “Overweight” Rating Reaffirmed at Piper Sandler

Shift4 Payments (NYSE:FOUR)‘s stock had its “overweight” rating reiterated by equities researchers at Piper Sandler in a research note issued to investors on Wednesday,Benzinga reports. They presently have a $143.00 price target on the stock, up from their prior price target of $120.00. Piper Sandler’s price objective would suggest a potential upside of 13.46% from the company’s current price.

A number of other equities analysts have also recently issued reports on FOUR. Oppenheimer raised their price objective on shares of Shift4 Payments from $120.00 to $121.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note on Thursday, December 19th. Wells Fargo & Company lifted their price objective on Shift4 Payments from $120.00 to $135.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Monday, February 3rd. The Goldman Sachs Group upped their price objective on Shift4 Payments from $106.00 to $119.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Thursday, November 14th. Morgan Stanley raised their target price on Shift4 Payments from $90.00 to $109.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a report on Wednesday, December 18th. Finally, B. Riley upped their price target on Shift4 Payments from $110.00 to $150.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Tuesday, November 26th. Seven analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and fifteen have given a buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the company currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $109.33.

Shift4 Payments Stock Performance

FOUR stock opened at $126.04 on Wednesday. The company has a 50 day moving average price of $110.87 and a 200 day moving average price of $97.38. Shift4 Payments has a fifty-two week low of $55.87 and a fifty-two week high of $127.50. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 2.71, a current ratio of 2.98 and a quick ratio of 2.97. The stock has a market capitalization of $11.36 billion, a PE ratio of 68.50, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.28 and a beta of 1.72.

Shift4 Payments (NYSE:FOUR) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, February 18th. The company reported $1.22 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.16 by $0.06. Shift4 Payments had a return on equity of 23.86% and a net margin of 4.04%. Analysts forecast that Shift4 Payments will post 2.95 EPS for the current year.

Insider Activity

In related news, insider David Taylor Lauber sold 5,000 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, December 2nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $113.71, for a total transaction of $568,550.00. Following the sale, the insider now owns 210,045 shares in the company, valued at approximately $23,884,216.95. This represents a 2.33 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is accessible through this hyperlink. Also, insider James J. Whalen sold 1,462 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, December 5th. The shares were sold at an average price of $101.07, for a total value of $147,764.34. Following the completion of the transaction, the insider now owns 37,089 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $3,748,585.23. This represents a 3.79 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold 11,462 shares of company stock worth $1,211,364 over the last ninety days. Insiders own 30.57% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Trading of Shift4 Payments

A number of large investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in FOUR. Wasatch Advisors LP raised its holdings in shares of Shift4 Payments by 50.8% in the 3rd quarter. Wasatch Advisors LP now owns 5,883,186 shares of the company’s stock valued at $521,250,000 after purchasing an additional 1,980,940 shares during the period. Vanguard Group Inc. raised its stake in Shift4 Payments by 9.4% in the fourth quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 6,539,486 shares of the company’s stock valued at $678,668,000 after buying an additional 562,774 shares during the period. Cat Rock Capital Management LP acquired a new stake in shares of Shift4 Payments in the fourth quarter valued at approximately $39,222,000. Darlington Partners Capital Management LP boosted its stake in shares of Shift4 Payments by 17.2% during the 4th quarter. Darlington Partners Capital Management LP now owns 2,510,014 shares of the company’s stock worth $260,489,000 after acquiring an additional 367,500 shares during the period. Finally, CIBC Private Wealth Group LLC increased its holdings in shares of Shift4 Payments by 41.3% during the 4th quarter. CIBC Private Wealth Group LLC now owns 1,198,845 shares of the company’s stock worth $127,689,000 after acquiring an additional 350,703 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 98.87% of the company’s stock.

About Shift4 Payments

Shift4 Payments, Inc (NYSE FOUR) provides integrated payment processing and technology solutions in the United States. Its payments platform provides omni-channel card acceptance and processing solutions, including end-to-end payment processing for various payment types; merchant acquiring; proprietary omni-channel gateway; complementary software integrations; integrated and mobile point-of-sale (POS) solutions; security and risk management solutions; and reporting and analytical tools, as well as tokenization, risk management/underwriting, payment device and chargeback management, fraud prevention, and gift card solutions.