Moderna Target of Unusually High Options Trading (NASDAQ:MRNA)

Moderna, Inc. (NASDAQ:MRNA) was the target of unusually large options trading activity on Friday. Stock investors acquired 127,398 call options on the stock. This represents an increase of approximately 40% compared to the average daily volume of 91,299 call options.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Several institutional investors have recently bought and sold shares of MRNA. Norges Bank acquired a new stake in shares of Moderna in the 2nd quarter valued at approximately $94,910,000. Federated Hermes Inc. increased its position in Moderna by 364.5% during the 2nd quarter. Federated Hermes Inc. now owns 2,869,271 shares of the company’s stock worth $79,163,000 after purchasing an additional 2,251,497 shares in the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC lifted its stake in Moderna by 19.1% in the 2nd quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 8,877,280 shares of the company’s stock valued at $244,458,000 after purchasing an additional 1,420,690 shares during the last quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. boosted its position in Moderna by 3.2% in the second quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 41,708,705 shares of the company’s stock valued at $1,150,743,000 after buying an additional 1,312,192 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Invesco Ltd. boosted its position in Moderna by 20.7% in the second quarter. Invesco Ltd. now owns 7,101,032 shares of the company’s stock valued at $195,917,000 after buying an additional 1,217,408 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 75.33% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

Several research analysts have recently commented on the stock. Barclays lowered their target price on shares of Moderna from $31.00 to $25.00 and set an “equal weight” rating on the stock in a report on Friday, November 7th. Needham & Company LLC reissued a “hold” rating on shares of Moderna in a research report on Monday, October 20th. Leerink Partners lifted their price objective on Moderna from $15.00 to $18.00 and gave the company an “underperform” rating in a report on Friday, November 21st. Morgan Stanley upped their target price on Moderna from $31.00 to $32.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research report on Friday, October 10th. Finally, Weiss Ratings reissued a “sell (e+)” rating on shares of Moderna in a report on Wednesday, October 8th. Two research analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating, twelve have given a Hold rating and five have given a Sell rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the company presently has a consensus rating of “Reduce” and an average price target of $29.46.

Moderna Price Performance

NASDAQ MRNA opened at $27.70 on Friday. The business has a fifty day moving average price of $25.86 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $26.98. The stock has a market capitalization of $10.82 billion, a PE ratio of -3.43 and a beta of 1.11. Moderna has a fifty-two week low of $22.28 and a fifty-two week high of $48.92.

Moderna (NASDAQ:MRNA) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, November 6th. The company reported ($0.51) EPS for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of ($2.15) by $1.64. Moderna had a negative return on equity of 29.81% and a negative net margin of 139.61%.The company had revenue of $1.02 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $893.29 million. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm earned $0.03 EPS. Moderna’s revenue was down 45.4% on a year-over-year basis. As a group, sell-side analysts expect that Moderna will post -9.61 earnings per share for the current year.

About Moderna

Moderna, Inc, a biotechnology company, discovers, develops, and commercializes messenger RNA therapeutics and vaccines for the treatment of infectious diseases, immuno-oncology, rare diseases, autoimmune, and cardiovascular diseases in the United States, Europe, and internationally. Its respiratory vaccines include COVID-19, influenza, and respiratory syncytial virus, spikevax, and hMPV/PIV3 vaccines; latent vaccines comprise cytomegalovirus, epstein-barr virus, herpes simplex virus, varicella zoster virus, and human immunodeficiency virus vaccines; public health vaccines consists of Zika, Nipah, Mpox vaccines; and infectious diseases vaccines, such as lyme and norovirus vaccines.