Braze (NASDAQ:BRZE) Shares Gap Up Following Analyst Upgrade

Braze, Inc. (NASDAQ:BRZE)’s stock price gapped up before the market opened on Friday after Citigroup raised their price target on the stock from $50.00 to $52.00. The stock had previously closed at $27.66, but opened at $32.68. Citigroup currently has a buy rating on the stock. Braze shares last traded at $31.39, with a volume of 2,547,547 shares trading hands.

BRZE has been the topic of several other reports. DA Davidson restated a “buy” rating and set a $40.00 price objective on shares of Braze in a report on Friday. Macquarie dropped their price objective on Braze from $40.00 to $35.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a report on Friday, June 6th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. dropped their price objective on Braze from $47.00 to $45.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a report on Friday, June 6th. Stephens set a $41.00 price objective on Braze and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a report on Friday, June 6th. Finally, Barclays lifted their target price on Braze from $35.00 to $39.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research report on Friday. Twenty investment analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and one has given a Hold rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $44.85.

Insider Buying and Selling at Braze

In related news, CAO Pankaj Malik sold 2,344 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, August 19th. The stock was sold at an average price of $25.94, for a total transaction of $60,803.36. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief accounting officer owned 66,930 shares in the company, valued at $1,736,164.20. The trade was a 3.38% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available through this hyperlink. Also, CEO William Magnuson sold 24,325 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, August 19th. The shares were sold at an average price of $25.94, for a total value of $630,990.50. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer owned 721,444 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $18,714,257.36. This represents a 3.26% decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last ninety days, insiders have sold 72,354 shares of company stock worth $1,914,998. 18.20% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the stock. GAMMA Investing LLC boosted its position in Braze by 12,025.6% during the 1st quarter. GAMMA Investing LLC now owns 26,555 shares of the company’s stock valued at $958,000 after purchasing an additional 26,336 shares during the period. Tower Research Capital LLC TRC boosted its position in Braze by 168.0% during the 4th quarter. Tower Research Capital LLC TRC now owns 646 shares of the company’s stock worth $27,000 after acquiring an additional 405 shares during the period. Bank of America Corp DE boosted its position in Braze by 57.6% during the 4th quarter. Bank of America Corp DE now owns 402,690 shares of the company’s stock worth $16,865,000 after acquiring an additional 147,127 shares during the period. Vanguard Group Inc. boosted its position in Braze by 5.3% during the 1st quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 8,911,907 shares of the company’s stock worth $321,542,000 after acquiring an additional 447,746 shares during the period. Finally, BNP Paribas Financial Markets acquired a new position in Braze during the 4th quarter worth $803,000. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 90.47% of the company’s stock.

Braze Trading Up 13.6%

The stock has a 50-day simple moving average of $27.32 and a 200-day simple moving average of $31.11. The company has a market cap of $3.32 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of -30.21 and a beta of 1.10.

Braze (NASDAQ:BRZE) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, June 5th. The company reported $0.07 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.05 by $0.02. The company had revenue of $162.06 million during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $158.60 million. Braze had a negative return on equity of 19.21% and a negative net margin of 16.62%.The firm’s quarterly revenue was up 19.6% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm posted ($0.05) EPS. As a group, research analysts expect that Braze, Inc. will post -0.98 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Braze Company Profile

Braze, Inc operates a customer engagement platform that provides interactions between consumers and brands worldwide. The company offers Braze software development kits that automatically manage data ingestion and deliver mobile and web notifications, in-application/in-browser interstitial messages, and content cards; REST API that can be used to import or export data or to trigger workflows between Braze and brands' existing technology stacks; Partner Data Integrations, which allow brands to sync user cohorts from partners; Data Transformation, in which brands can programmatically sync and transform user data; and Braze Cloud Data Ingestion that enables brands to harness their customer data.