Russell Investments Group Ltd. Reduces Position in StoneCo Ltd. $STNE

Russell Investments Group Ltd. trimmed its holdings in shares of StoneCo Ltd. (NASDAQ:STNE) by 45.0% during the first quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the SEC. The fund owned 164,492 shares of the company’s stock after selling 134,442 shares during the quarter. Russell Investments Group Ltd. owned 0.06% of StoneCo worth $1,724,000 as of its most recent filing with the SEC.

A number of other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also modified their holdings of the business. Point72 Asset Management L.P. increased its position in shares of StoneCo by 22.2% during the fourth quarter. Point72 Asset Management L.P. now owns 13,956,554 shares of the company’s stock worth $111,234,000 after acquiring an additional 2,534,079 shares during the last quarter. Squadra Investments Gestao DE Recursos LTDA. increased its position in shares of StoneCo by 46.8% during the fourth quarter. Squadra Investments Gestao DE Recursos LTDA. now owns 13,951,183 shares of the company’s stock worth $111,191,000 after acquiring an additional 4,446,709 shares during the last quarter. Nuveen Asset Management LLC increased its position in shares of StoneCo by 40.3% during the fourth quarter. Nuveen Asset Management LLC now owns 6,993,611 shares of the company’s stock worth $55,739,000 after acquiring an additional 2,008,710 shares during the last quarter. Nuveen LLC purchased a new stake in shares of StoneCo during the first quarter worth about $70,502,000. Finally, JGP Global Gestao de Recursos Ltda. increased its position in shares of StoneCo by 484.8% during the first quarter. JGP Global Gestao de Recursos Ltda. now owns 4,472,738 shares of the company’s stock worth $46,874,000 after acquiring an additional 3,707,941 shares during the last quarter. 73.19% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

StoneCo Price Performance

Shares of NASDAQ STNE opened at $15.67 on Wednesday. StoneCo Ltd. has a twelve month low of $7.72 and a twelve month high of $16.68. The company has a current ratio of 1.48, a quick ratio of 1.48 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.76. The company has a market capitalization of $4.48 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of -22.39, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 0.41 and a beta of 1.88. The business has a 50 day simple moving average of $14.75 and a 200-day simple moving average of $12.84.

StoneCo (NASDAQ:STNE) last posted its earnings results on Thursday, August 7th. The company reported $0.39 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.36 by $0.03. The company had revenue of $643.82 million during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $3.78 billion. StoneCo had a positive return on equity of 18.71% and a negative net margin of 8.37%. As a group, equities research analysts expect that StoneCo Ltd. will post 1.16 earnings per share for the current year.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of brokerages have recently issued reports on STNE. Santander raised StoneCo from a “neutral” rating to an “outperform” rating in a research report on Wednesday, May 21st. Barclays upped their price objective on StoneCo from $13.00 to $15.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Monday, May 12th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. lifted their target price on StoneCo from $15.50 to $18.50 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research report on Wednesday, July 16th. Wall Street Zen downgraded StoneCo from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a report on Friday, June 6th. Finally, Zacks Research upgraded StoneCo to a “strong-buy” rating in a report on Tuesday, August 12th. Two investment analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, seven have issued a Buy rating, one has assigned a Hold rating and one has assigned a Sell rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $15.07.

StoneCo Profile

StoneCo Ltd. provides financial technology and software solutions to merchants and integrated partners to conduct electronic commerce across in-store, online, and mobile channels in Brazil. It distributes its solutions, principally through proprietary Stone Hubs, which offer hyper-local sales and services; and sells solutions to brick-and-mortar and digital merchants through sales team.