Simulations Plus, Inc. (NASDAQ:SLP) Receives Consensus Recommendation of “Buy” from Analysts

Shares of Simulations Plus, Inc. (NASDAQ:SLP) have been assigned a consensus recommendation of “Buy” from the seven analysts that are currently covering the stock, MarketBeat.com reports. One research analyst has rated the stock with a hold recommendation, five have issued a buy recommendation and one has given a strong buy recommendation to the company. The average twelve-month price target among brokerages that have covered the stock in the last year is $51.40.

SLP has been the subject of several recent research reports. StockNews.com lowered Simulations Plus from a “hold” rating to a “sell” rating in a research report on Monday, November 4th. BTIG Research dropped their target price on Simulations Plus from $60.00 to $50.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a report on Thursday, October 24th. William Blair restated an “outperform” rating on shares of Simulations Plus in a report on Wednesday, November 6th. Finally, Stephens started coverage on Simulations Plus in a research report on Friday, November 15th. They issued an “overweight” rating and a $39.00 price target for the company.

Insider Buying and Selling at Simulations Plus

In other Simulations Plus news, Director Walter S. Woltosz sold 20,000 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Monday, December 2nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $31.76, for a total value of $635,200.00. Following the completion of the sale, the director now directly owns 3,442,584 shares in the company, valued at approximately $109,336,467.84. This represents a 0.58 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. 19.40% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

Institutional Trading of Simulations Plus

Several institutional investors and hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in SLP. Barclays PLC increased its position in Simulations Plus by 390.6% during the 3rd quarter. Barclays PLC now owns 28,473 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $911,000 after purchasing an additional 22,669 shares during the period. Geode Capital Management LLC increased its holdings in Simulations Plus by 4.4% during the third quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 448,618 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $14,367,000 after buying an additional 18,924 shares during the period. Deerfield Management Company L.P. Series C bought a new position in Simulations Plus in the second quarter worth approximately $811,000. State Street Corp lifted its holdings in Simulations Plus by 4.7% during the third quarter. State Street Corp now owns 640,303 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $20,503,000 after buying an additional 28,953 shares during the period. Finally, BNP Paribas Financial Markets boosted its position in Simulations Plus by 402.9% during the 3rd quarter. BNP Paribas Financial Markets now owns 39,944 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $1,279,000 after acquiring an additional 32,002 shares in the last quarter. 78.08% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Simulations Plus Price Performance

Shares of SLP opened at $29.10 on Tuesday. The stock has a market capitalization of $584.47 million, a price-to-earnings ratio of 59.39 and a beta of 0.80. Simulations Plus has a 1 year low of $27.07 and a 1 year high of $51.22. The business’s 50 day simple moving average is $29.78 and its 200-day simple moving average is $34.16.

Simulations Plus (NASDAQ:SLP) last released its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, October 23rd. The technology company reported $0.06 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.04 by $0.02. Simulations Plus had a net margin of 14.15% and a return on equity of 6.16%. The company had revenue of $18.70 million for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $19.73 million. During the same quarter in the prior year, the firm earned $0.18 earnings per share. Simulations Plus’s revenue was up 19.9% on a year-over-year basis. On average, sell-side analysts expect that Simulations Plus will post 1.1 earnings per share for the current year.

About Simulations Plus

Simulations Plus, Inc develops drug discovery and development software for modeling and simulation, and prediction of molecular properties utilizing artificial intelligence and machine learning based technology worldwide. The company operates through two segments, Software and Services. It offers GastroPlus, which simulates the absorption and drug interaction of compounds administered to humans and animals; and DDDPlus and MembranePlus simulation products.