Bio-Rad Laboratories (NYSE:BIO) Shares Gap Down to $290.86

Bio-Rad Laboratories, Inc. (NYSE:BIO) shares gapped down before the market opened on Thursday . The stock had previously closed at $290.86, but opened at $275.83. Bio-Rad Laboratories shares last traded at $273.29, with a volume of 49,068 shares changing hands.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of brokerages have recently issued reports on BIO. UBS Group lifted their price target on Bio-Rad Laboratories from $395.00 to $420.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Friday, February 16th. StockNews.com downgraded Bio-Rad Laboratories from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Friday, April 5th. Royal Bank of Canada dropped their price target on Bio-Rad Laboratories from $484.00 to $480.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a research report on Friday, February 16th. Finally, Citigroup downgraded Bio-Rad Laboratories from a “buy” rating to a “neutral” rating and dropped their price target for the company from $400.00 to $365.00 in a research report on Wednesday, April 3rd. Two research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and four have issued a buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, Bio-Rad Laboratories currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $468.00.

Bio-Rad Laboratories Stock Down 0.5 %

The stock has a 50-day moving average of $329.85 and a two-hundred day moving average of $320.23. The company has a market cap of $7.98 billion, a P/E ratio of -13.02 and a beta of 0.87. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.14, a quick ratio of 4.34 and a current ratio of 5.83.

Bio-Rad Laboratories (NYSE:BIO) last released its earnings results on Thursday, February 15th. The medical research company reported $3.10 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.93 by $0.17. The company had revenue of $681.18 million during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $685.00 million. Bio-Rad Laboratories had a positive return on equity of 3.90% and a negative net margin of 23.86%. Bio-Rad Laboratories’s quarterly revenue was down 6.7% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the previous year, the company posted $3.31 EPS. On average, research analysts anticipate that Bio-Rad Laboratories, Inc. will post 10.41 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other news, EVP Michael Crowley sold 3,000 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, February 27th. The stock was sold at an average price of $336.00, for a total transaction of $1,008,000.00. Following the completion of the sale, the executive vice president now owns 6,942 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $2,332,512. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is accessible through the SEC website. 17.06% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

Institutional Trading of Bio-Rad Laboratories

A number of institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in the stock. Vanguard Group Inc. boosted its stake in shares of Bio-Rad Laboratories by 2.0% during the fourth quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 2,389,889 shares of the medical research company’s stock valued at $771,671,000 after purchasing an additional 46,119 shares during the period. BlackRock Inc. boosted its stake in shares of Bio-Rad Laboratories by 1.0% during the first quarter. BlackRock Inc. now owns 1,598,604 shares of the medical research company’s stock valued at $765,763,000 after purchasing an additional 16,216 shares during the period. State Street Corp boosted its stake in shares of Bio-Rad Laboratories by 0.3% during the third quarter. State Street Corp now owns 958,704 shares of the medical research company’s stock valued at $399,914,000 after purchasing an additional 2,869 shares during the period. Brown Advisory Inc. boosted its stake in shares of Bio-Rad Laboratories by 3.1% during the third quarter. Brown Advisory Inc. now owns 955,732 shares of the medical research company’s stock valued at $342,582,000 after purchasing an additional 28,724 shares during the period. Finally, Bank of America Corp DE boosted its stake in shares of Bio-Rad Laboratories by 12.6% during the first quarter. Bank of America Corp DE now owns 460,215 shares of the medical research company’s stock valued at $220,452,000 after purchasing an additional 51,419 shares during the period. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 65.24% of the company’s stock.

About Bio-Rad Laboratories

Bio-Rad Laboratories, Inc manufactures and distributes life science research and clinical diagnostic products in the United States, Europe, Asia, Canada, and Latin America. It operates through two segments, Life Science and Clinical Diagnostics. The company develops, manufactures, and markets instruments, systems, reagents, and consumables to separate, purify, characterize, and quantitate biological materials such as cells, proteins, and nucleic acids for proteomics, genomics, biopharmaceutical production, cellular biology, and food safety markets.