AtriCure (NASDAQ:ATRC) Shares Gap Up to $22.71

AtriCure, Inc. (NASDAQ:ATRC) shares gapped up prior to trading on Tuesday . The stock had previously closed at $22.71, but opened at $23.92. AtriCure shares last traded at $23.97, with a volume of 179,703 shares changing hands.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

ATRC has been the subject of several recent research reports. Needham & Company LLC reiterated a “buy” rating and issued a $46.00 price objective on shares of AtriCure in a research note on Wednesday, April 10th. UBS Group lifted their price objective on AtriCure from $57.00 to $58.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Friday, February 16th. StockNews.com lowered AtriCure from a “hold” rating to a “sell” rating in a research report on Wednesday, March 27th. Stifel Nicolaus cut their target price on AtriCure from $50.00 to $42.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research report on Friday, February 16th. Finally, Oppenheimer raised AtriCure from a “market perform” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $32.00 target price on the stock in a research report on Tuesday. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating and six have assigned a buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, the company currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $52.63.

AtriCure Stock Performance

The company has a quick ratio of 2.66, a current ratio of 3.57 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.15. The firm has a market cap of $1.12 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of -34.92 and a beta of 1.38. The stock has a fifty day moving average price of $30.25 and a 200-day moving average price of $33.84.

AtriCure (NASDAQ:ATRC) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, February 15th. The medical device company reported ($0.21) earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of ($0.22) by $0.01. AtriCure had a negative return on equity of 7.55% and a negative net margin of 7.62%. The firm had revenue of $106.50 million for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $103.68 million. During the same period in the previous year, the business earned ($0.09) earnings per share. The company’s revenue for the quarter was up 21.0% compared to the same quarter last year. On average, analysts expect that AtriCure, Inc. will post -0.71 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Insider Activity at AtriCure

In related news, insider Karl S. Dahlquist sold 8,231 shares of AtriCure stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, March 5th. The stock was sold at an average price of $37.36, for a total value of $307,510.16. Following the sale, the insider now directly owns 52,839 shares in the company, valued at $1,974,065.04. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which can be accessed through this link. In other AtriCure news, insider Karl S. Dahlquist sold 8,231 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Tuesday, March 5th. The stock was sold at an average price of $37.36, for a total transaction of $307,510.16. Following the sale, the insider now directly owns 52,839 shares in the company, valued at $1,974,065.04. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which can be accessed through the SEC website. Also, insider Karl S. Dahlquist sold 1,885 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Monday, March 18th. The stock was sold at an average price of $32.16, for a total value of $60,621.60. Following the sale, the insider now owns 50,954 shares in the company, valued at $1,638,680.64. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 13,116 shares of company stock worth $468,797 over the last three months. 3.20% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

Institutional Trading of AtriCure

Institutional investors have recently bought and sold shares of the company. Knights of Columbus Asset Advisors LLC boosted its position in AtriCure by 165.8% during the fourth quarter. Knights of Columbus Asset Advisors LLC now owns 123,540 shares of the medical device company’s stock worth $4,409,000 after purchasing an additional 77,055 shares in the last quarter. CenterBook Partners LP acquired a new position in shares of AtriCure in the third quarter worth $770,000. Decheng Capital Management III Cayman LLC acquired a new position in shares of AtriCure in the third quarter worth $2,026,000. Envestnet Asset Management Inc. raised its holdings in shares of AtriCure by 127.9% in the third quarter. Envestnet Asset Management Inc. now owns 116,990 shares of the medical device company’s stock worth $5,124,000 after acquiring an additional 65,653 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Vanguard Group Inc. raised its holdings in shares of AtriCure by 0.9% in the third quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 4,689,883 shares of the medical device company’s stock worth $205,417,000 after acquiring an additional 43,431 shares during the last quarter. 99.11% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

About AtriCure

AtriCure, Inc develops, manufactures, and sells devices for surgical ablation of cardiac tissue, exclusion of the left atrial appendage, and temporarily blocking pain by ablating peripheral nerves to medical centers in the United States, Europe, the Asia-Pacific, and internationally. The company offers Isolator Synergy Clamps, single-use disposable radio frequency products; multifunctional pens and linear ablation devices, such as the MAX Pen device that enables surgeons to evaluate cardiac arrhythmias, perform temporary cardiac pacing, sensing, and stimulation, and ablate cardiac tissue with the same device; and the Coolrail device, which enables users to make longer linear lines of ablation.