Short Interest in Herbalife Ltd. (NYSE:HLF) Decreases By 5.8%

Herbalife Ltd. (NYSE:HLF) saw a significant decrease in short interest in August. As of August 31st, there was short interest totalling 14,710,000 shares, a decrease of 5.8% from the August 15th total of 15,610,000 shares. Currently, 15.1% of the shares of the stock are sold short. Based on an average daily trading volume, of 2,020,000 shares, the short-interest ratio is currently 7.3 days.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

Several research analysts recently weighed in on the company. B. Riley upped their price target on Herbalife from $16.00 to $17.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Thursday, August 1st. Mizuho upped their target price on Herbalife from $10.00 to $11.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a report on Friday, June 7th. DA Davidson raised their price target on shares of Herbalife from $9.50 to $13.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a report on Thursday, August 1st. Finally, StockNews.com upgraded shares of Herbalife from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a report on Friday, September 13th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, four have issued a hold rating and two have assigned a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat.com, Herbalife has an average rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $12.33.

Insider Buying and Selling at Herbalife

In other news, Director Juan Miguel Mendoza bought 10,000 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Monday, September 9th. The stock was bought at an average cost of $7.11 per share, for a total transaction of $71,100.00. Following the completion of the acquisition, the director now directly owns 120,000 shares in the company, valued at approximately $853,200. The purchase was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available at this link. 0.94% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

Institutional Trading of Herbalife

Institutional investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the business. GSA Capital Partners LLP lifted its stake in Herbalife by 523.6% in the fourth quarter. GSA Capital Partners LLP now owns 177,281 shares of the company’s stock valued at $2,705,000 after acquiring an additional 148,851 shares during the last quarter. Russell Investments Group Ltd. raised its position in shares of Herbalife by 5,249.2% in the first quarter. Russell Investments Group Ltd. now owns 138,599 shares of the company’s stock valued at $1,390,000 after purchasing an additional 136,008 shares during the period. Hotchkis & Wiley Capital Management LLC raised its position in shares of Herbalife by 7.7% in the fourth quarter. Hotchkis & Wiley Capital Management LLC now owns 1,624,370 shares of the company’s stock valued at $24,788,000 after purchasing an additional 116,030 shares during the period. Capstone Investment Advisors LLC bought a new position in shares of Herbalife in the first quarter valued at approximately $1,397,000. Finally, Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD raised its position in shares of Herbalife by 4.6% in the first quarter. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD now owns 82,287 shares of the company’s stock valued at $827,000 after purchasing an additional 3,647 shares during the period.

Herbalife Stock Performance

HLF stock opened at $7.04 on Friday. The stock has a market cap of $703.77 million, a P/E ratio of 5.14 and a beta of 1.20. The firm has a 50 day simple moving average of $9.22 and a 200 day simple moving average of $9.66. Herbalife has a 52 week low of $6.68 and a 52 week high of $15.71.

Herbalife (NYSE:HLF) last posted its earnings results on Wednesday, July 31st. The company reported $0.54 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.43 by $0.11. The firm had revenue of $1.28 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $1.33 billion. Herbalife had a net margin of 1.63% and a negative return on equity of 18.69%. The company’s revenue was down 2.5% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the previous year, the company earned $0.74 earnings per share. Sell-side analysts predict that Herbalife will post 1.34 EPS for the current year.

Herbalife Company Profile

Herbalife Ltd. provides health and wellness products in North America, Mexico, South and Central America, Europe, the Middle East, Africa, China, and the Asia Pacific. It offers products in the areas of weight management; targeted nutrition; energy, sports, and fitness; outer nutrition; and literature and promotional items.