31,300 Shares in Photronics, Inc. (NASDAQ:PLAB) Bought by Louisiana State Employees Retirement System

Louisiana State Employees Retirement System purchased a new position in Photronics, Inc. (NASDAQ:PLAB) during the 4th quarter, Holdings Channel reports. The firm purchased 31,300 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock, valued at approximately $982,000.

Other hedge funds and other institutional investors also recently bought and sold shares of the company. First Dallas Securities Inc. acquired a new stake in Photronics in the 3rd quarter worth $716,000. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. increased its stake in Photronics by 20.3% in the fourth quarter. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. now owns 827,315 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock valued at $25,953,000 after acquiring an additional 139,734 shares during the period. Jacobs Levy Equity Management Inc. increased its stake in Photronics by 187.6% in the third quarter. Jacobs Levy Equity Management Inc. now owns 169,834 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock valued at $3,432,000 after acquiring an additional 110,792 shares during the period. Skandinaviska Enskilda Banken AB publ bought a new stake in Photronics in the third quarter valued at about $422,000. Finally, American Century Companies Inc. increased its stake in Photronics by 18.3% in the third quarter. American Century Companies Inc. now owns 1,029,747 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock valued at $20,811,000 after acquiring an additional 159,393 shares during the period. 88.38% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Separately, StockNews.com cut shares of Photronics from a “strong-buy” rating to a “buy” rating in a research note on Thursday, February 22nd.

Photronics Stock Up 2.0 %

NASDAQ PLAB opened at $27.51 on Thursday. The stock has a market cap of $1.74 billion, a P/E ratio of 12.34 and a beta of 1.40. The company’s 50-day simple moving average is $28.51 and its 200 day simple moving average is $26.47. Photronics, Inc. has a twelve month low of $13.86 and a twelve month high of $34.16.

Photronics (NASDAQ:PLAB) last released its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, February 21st. The semiconductor company reported $0.48 EPS for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.49 by ($0.01). The firm had revenue of $216.30 million during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $220.00 million. Photronics had a net margin of 15.34% and a return on equity of 10.37%. Photronics’s quarterly revenue was up 2.5% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter last year, the firm earned $0.40 earnings per share. Research analysts anticipate that Photronics, Inc. will post 2.15 earnings per share for the current year.

Photronics Company Profile

Photronics, Inc, together with its subsidiaries, engages in the manufacture and sale of photomask products and services in the United States, Taiwan, China, Korea, Europe, and internationally. It offers photomasks that are used in the manufacture of integrated circuits and flat panel displays (FPDs); and to transfer circuit patterns onto semiconductor wafers, and FDP substrates.