GAMMA Investing LLC Cuts Stake in EchoStar Corporation $SATS

GAMMA Investing LLC trimmed its holdings in shares of EchoStar Corporation (NASDAQ:SATS) by 32.9% in the 2nd quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The fund owned 2,310 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock after selling 1,131 shares during the quarter. GAMMA Investing LLC’s holdings in EchoStar were worth $64,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Several other institutional investors and hedge funds have also made changes to their positions in SATS. Kingstone Capital Partners Texas LLC bought a new stake in shares of EchoStar during the second quarter worth $9,541,000. Northern Trust Corp raised its holdings in shares of EchoStar by 25.3% in the first quarter. Northern Trust Corp now owns 1,699,986 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock valued at $43,486,000 after acquiring an additional 343,590 shares in the last quarter. Retirement Systems of Alabama bought a new stake in shares of EchoStar in the first quarter valued at about $3,762,000. Corebridge Financial Inc. raised its holdings in shares of EchoStar by 196.8% in the first quarter. Corebridge Financial Inc. now owns 192,280 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock valued at $4,919,000 after acquiring an additional 127,496 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Caxton Associates LLP bought a new stake in shares of EchoStar in the first quarter valued at about $3,172,000. 33.62% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

EchoStar Price Performance

Shares of NASDAQ SATS opened at $77.12 on Friday. EchoStar Corporation has a 52 week low of $14.90 and a 52 week high of $85.37. The firm has a market cap of $22.19 billion, a P/E ratio of -73.45 and a beta of 0.96. The business’s 50 day moving average price is $53.11 and its 200 day moving average price is $34.02. The company has a quick ratio of 1.15, a current ratio of 1.22 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.28.

EchoStar (NASDAQ:SATS) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Friday, August 1st. The communications equipment provider reported ($1.06) earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of ($1.12) by $0.06. EchoStar had a negative return on equity of 1.58% and a negative net margin of 2.04%.The company had revenue of $3.72 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $3.80 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the company posted ($0.76) earnings per share. EchoStar’s revenue for the quarter was down 5.8% on a year-over-year basis. On average, sell-side analysts expect that EchoStar Corporation will post -1.99 earnings per share for the current year.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several analysts recently weighed in on the company. TD Cowen lifted their price objective on EchoStar from $28.00 to $67.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Wednesday, August 27th. Morgan Stanley lifted their price objective on EchoStar from $59.00 to $91.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a report on Tuesday, September 9th. Citigroup lifted their price objective on EchoStar from $67.00 to $85.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a report on Tuesday, September 23rd. Weiss Ratings restated a “sell (d-)” rating on shares of EchoStar in a report on Saturday, September 27th. Finally, Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft set a $105.00 target price on EchoStar in a research note on Tuesday, September 9th. Three analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating, three have issued a Hold rating and one has issued a Sell rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $75.20.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other EchoStar news, CEO Hamid Akhavan sold 233,918 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, September 12th. The stock was sold at an average price of $75.35, for a total value of $17,625,721.30. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer directly owned 376,805 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $28,392,256.75. The trade was a 38.30% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through this link. Also, Director Kathleen Q. Abernathy sold 16,754 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, September 9th. The shares were sold at an average price of $82.35, for a total value of $1,379,691.90. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last three months, insiders sold 460,740 shares of company stock valued at $35,967,480. Insiders own 55.90% of the company’s stock.

About EchoStar

EchoStar Corporation, together with its subsidiaries, provides networking technologies and services worldwide. The company operates in four segments: Pay-TV, Retail Wireless, 5G Network Deployment, Broadband and Satellite Services. The Pay-TV segment offers a direct broadcast and fixed satellite services; designs, develops, and distributes receiver system; and provides digital broadcast operations, including satellite uplinking/downlinking, transmission and, other services to third-party pay-TV providers; and multichannel, live-linear and on-demand streaming over-the-top internet-based domestic, international, Latino, and Freestream video programming services under the DISH and SLING brand names.