Virgin Galactic Sees Unusually Large Options Volume (NYSE:SPCE)

Virgin Galactic Holdings, Inc. (NYSE:SPCE) was the target of some unusual options trading on Tuesday. Stock traders purchased 23,823 call options on the stock. This is an increase of approximately 63% compared to the typical volume of 14,651 call options.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of analysts have commented on SPCE shares. Truist Financial reduced their price target on Virgin Galactic from $3.00 to $2.00 and set a “hold” rating for the company in a research report on Wednesday, February 28th. Wells Fargo & Company reduced their price target on Virgin Galactic from $1.75 to $1.00 and set an “underweight” rating for the company in a research report on Thursday, April 4th. Two research analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating and three have assigned a hold rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, Virgin Galactic currently has an average rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $2.30.

Institutional Trading of Virgin Galactic

Institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in the business. Vanguard Group Inc. boosted its stake in Virgin Galactic by 29.2% during the third quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 30,165,775 shares of the company’s stock valued at $54,298,000 after buying an additional 6,823,646 shares during the last quarter. Quadrature Capital Ltd boosted its stake in Virgin Galactic by 822.7% during the third quarter. Quadrature Capital Ltd now owns 650,766 shares of the company’s stock valued at $1,175,000 after buying an additional 580,238 shares during the last quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. boosted its stake in Virgin Galactic by 27.5% during the third quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. now owns 2,357,773 shares of the company’s stock valued at $4,244,000 after buying an additional 507,946 shares during the last quarter. Dark Forest Capital Management LP bought a new position in Virgin Galactic during the third quarter valued at approximately $703,000. Finally, Citigroup Inc. boosted its stake in Virgin Galactic by 92.3% during the third quarter. Citigroup Inc. now owns 761,902 shares of the company’s stock valued at $1,371,000 after buying an additional 365,657 shares during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 46.62% of the company’s stock.

Virgin Galactic Stock Performance

NYSE:SPCE opened at $0.92 on Wednesday. The company has a current ratio of 5.12, a quick ratio of 5.03 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.83. Virgin Galactic has a 12-month low of $0.70 and a 12-month high of $6.17. The stock has a 50-day moving average price of $1.46 and a 200 day moving average price of $1.82. The stock has a market capitalization of $368.12 million, a P/E ratio of -0.59 and a beta of 1.60.

Virgin Galactic (NYSE:SPCE) last released its earnings results on Tuesday, February 27th. The company reported ($0.25) earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of ($0.30) by $0.05. Virgin Galactic had a negative return on equity of 102.01% and a negative net margin of 7,387.31%. The firm had revenue of $2.81 million during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $2.99 million. Equities research analysts forecast that Virgin Galactic will post -0.96 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Virgin Galactic Company Profile

Virgin Galactic Holdings, Inc, an aerospace and space travel company, focuses on the development, manufacture, and operation of spaceships and related technologies. The company engages in the design and development, manufacturing, ground and flight testing, spaceflight operation, and post-flight maintenance of spaceflight systems for private individuals, researchers, and government agencies.