Intech Investment Management LLC Buys Shares of 15,965 Veeco Instruments Inc. (NASDAQ:VECO)

Intech Investment Management LLC bought a new stake in shares of Veeco Instruments Inc. (NASDAQ:VECO) in the 3rd quarter, HoldingsChannel reports. The fund bought 15,965 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock, valued at approximately $529,000.

Several other institutional investors have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in VECO. Signaturefd LLC grew its position in Veeco Instruments by 130.6% in the 3rd quarter. Signaturefd LLC now owns 1,328 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock valued at $44,000 after buying an additional 752 shares in the last quarter. KBC Group NV boosted its holdings in Veeco Instruments by 46.8% during the third quarter. KBC Group NV now owns 2,088 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock worth $69,000 after buying an additional 666 shares in the last quarter. GAMMA Investing LLC lifted its position in shares of Veeco Instruments by 237.4% during the 2nd quarter. GAMMA Investing LLC now owns 1,677 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock valued at $78,000 after acquiring an additional 1,180 shares during the last quarter. nVerses Capital LLC lifted its position in shares of Veeco Instruments by 733.3% during the 2nd quarter. nVerses Capital LLC now owns 2,500 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock valued at $117,000 after acquiring an additional 2,200 shares during the last quarter. Finally, US Bancorp DE raised its stake in Veeco Instruments by 14.8% during the 3rd quarter. US Bancorp DE now owns 3,864 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock valued at $128,000 after purchasing an additional 498 shares during the period. Institutional investors own 98.46% of the company’s stock.

Insider Buying and Selling

In related news, CFO John P. Kiernan sold 2,500 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Tuesday, September 10th. The stock was sold at an average price of $29.04, for a total transaction of $72,600.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief financial officer now directly owns 85,142 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $2,472,523.68. This trade represents a 2.85 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available at this hyperlink. Insiders sold 7,500 shares of company stock worth $225,850 in the last quarter. 2.40% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several analysts have issued reports on VECO shares. Needham & Company LLC reissued a “buy” rating and set a $55.00 target price on shares of Veeco Instruments in a research note on Wednesday, August 7th. StockNews.com downgraded shares of Veeco Instruments from a “hold” rating to a “sell” rating in a research report on Thursday. Northland Securities lowered their target price on shares of Veeco Instruments from $53.00 to $47.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a research report on Wednesday, August 7th. The Goldman Sachs Group reduced their price objective on shares of Veeco Instruments from $35.00 to $30.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a research note on Thursday, November 7th. Finally, Benchmark dropped their target price on shares of Veeco Instruments from $42.00 to $38.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a report on Thursday, November 7th. One analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, three have assigned a hold rating and four have issued a buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $42.14.

Veeco Instruments Stock Up 0.9 %

NASDAQ VECO opened at $27.87 on Monday. The firm has a 50-day simple moving average of $29.91 and a 200 day simple moving average of $36.47. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.33, a quick ratio of 2.41 and a current ratio of 3.54. The stock has a market cap of $1.58 billion, a PE ratio of 20.64 and a beta of 1.17. Veeco Instruments Inc. has a twelve month low of $25.52 and a twelve month high of $49.25.

Veeco Instruments (NASDAQ:VECO) last released its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, November 6th. The semiconductor company reported $0.46 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.45 by $0.01. Veeco Instruments had a return on equity of 10.92% and a net margin of 11.34%. The company had revenue of $184.80 million for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $180.57 million. During the same period in the prior year, the company posted $0.41 EPS. The company’s revenue was up 4.2% compared to the same quarter last year. On average, research analysts forecast that Veeco Instruments Inc. will post 1.12 EPS for the current year.

Veeco Instruments Company Profile

Veeco Instruments Inc, together with its subsidiaries, develops, manufactures, sells, and supports semiconductor and thin film process equipment primarily to make electronic devices in the United States, Europe, the Middle East, and Africa, China, Rest of the Asia-Pacific, and internationally. The company offers laser annealing, ion beam deposition and etch, metal organic chemical vapor deposition, single wafer wet processing and surface preparation, molecular beam epitaxy, advanced packaging lithography, atomic layer deposition, and other deposition systems.