GDS Holdings Limited (NASDAQ:GDS) Short Interest Up 6.6% in September

GDS Holdings Limited (NASDAQ:GDS) was the target of a significant increase in short interest in the month of September. As of September 15th, there was short interest totalling 7,450,000 shares, an increase of 6.6% from the August 31st total of 6,990,000 shares. Currently, 4.2% of the shares of the company are sold short. Based on an average trading volume of 1,600,000 shares, the short-interest ratio is currently 4.7 days.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of brokerages have recently commented on GDS. Bank of America increased their price target on GDS from $12.40 to $22.40 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Tuesday, August 27th. Nomura Securities raised shares of GDS to a “strong-buy” rating in a report on Monday, August 26th. Finally, Royal Bank of Canada upgraded shares of GDS from a “sector perform” rating to an “outperform” rating and lifted their target price for the stock from $13.00 to $14.00 in a research note on Monday, July 8th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, one has given a hold rating, three have assigned a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $15.29.

Institutional Trading of GDS

Several institutional investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in GDS. Quadrature Capital Ltd purchased a new position in shares of GDS in the fourth quarter worth $107,000. Vanguard Personalized Indexing Management LLC bought a new stake in GDS in the 2nd quarter worth $108,000. Capstone Investment Advisors LLC bought a new position in shares of GDS during the first quarter valued at about $188,000. Marshall Wace LLP purchased a new stake in shares of GDS during the second quarter worth about $203,000. Finally, Headlands Technologies LLC bought a new stake in shares of GDS in the second quarter worth about $256,000. 33.71% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

GDS Price Performance

Shares of NASDAQ:GDS traded up $1.98 during trading on Tuesday, reaching $22.38. The company had a trading volume of 2,143,532 shares, compared to its average volume of 1,625,357. The company has a fifty day moving average of $15.03 and a two-hundred day moving average of $10.85. The company has a current ratio of 1.39, a quick ratio of 1.39 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 2.30. The stock has a market capitalization of $4.26 billion, a P/E ratio of -6.89 and a beta of 0.24. GDS has a 12 month low of $5.01 and a 12 month high of $22.77.

GDS (NASDAQ:GDS) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, August 21st. The company reported ($0.18) earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of ($0.25) by $0.07. The firm had revenue of $388.92 million during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $384.14 million. GDS had a negative return on equity of 9.10% and a negative net margin of 39.96%. Equities research analysts forecast that GDS will post -1.14 earnings per share for the current year.

GDS Company Profile

GDS Holdings Limited, together with its subsidiaries, develops and operates data centers in the People's Republic of China. The company provides colocation services comprising critical facilities space, customer-available power, racks, and cooling; managed hosting services, including business continuity and disaster recovery, network management, data storage, system security, operating system, database, and server middleware services; managed cloud services; and consulting services.