Qiagen (NYSE:QGEN) Rating Increased to Buy at Wall Street Zen

Qiagen (NYSE:QGEN) was upgraded by analysts at Wall Street Zen from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a report released on Saturday.

Several other equities analysts also recently issued reports on QGEN. Barclays set a $58.00 price objective on shares of Qiagen and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a report on Friday, February 6th. TD Cowen reaffirmed a “hold” rating on shares of Qiagen in a research note on Friday, February 6th. Robert W. Baird set a $53.00 price objective on Qiagen in a report on Friday, February 6th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. increased their target price on Qiagen from $55.00 to $60.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a report on Friday, February 6th. Finally, Jefferies Financial Group restated a “buy” rating and issued a $59.00 target price on shares of Qiagen in a research report on Thursday, February 5th. Four research analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and eight have assigned a Hold rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, the company currently has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $55.20.

Qiagen Price Performance

Shares of Qiagen stock opened at $48.62 on Friday. The firm has a market cap of $10.27 billion, a PE ratio of 24.11, a P/E/G ratio of 2.36 and a beta of 0.67. Qiagen has a twelve month low of $39.61 and a twelve month high of $57.81. The company has a quick ratio of 3.31, a current ratio of 3.90 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.44. The business has a 50-day moving average price of $49.90 and a 200 day moving average price of $49.45.

Qiagen (NYSE:QGEN) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, February 5th. The company reported $0.62 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.61 by $0.01. The company had revenue of $540.42 million for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $528.53 million. Qiagen had a return on equity of 14.56% and a net margin of 20.33%.Qiagen’s quarterly revenue was up 3.6% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period last year, the company earned $0.61 earnings per share. Sell-side analysts predict that Qiagen will post 2.26 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On Qiagen

Institutional investors and hedge funds have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the stock. Massachusetts Financial Services Co. MA boosted its position in shares of Qiagen by 1.1% during the 4th quarter. Massachusetts Financial Services Co. MA now owns 24,205,881 shares of the company’s stock valued at $1,088,538,000 after acquiring an additional 264,921 shares during the last quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. raised its stake in Qiagen by 1.3% during the fourth quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 9,542,944 shares of the company’s stock worth $433,871,000 after purchasing an additional 118,135 shares during the period. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD boosted its holdings in Qiagen by 12.1% in the 4th quarter. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD now owns 8,429,424 shares of the company’s stock valued at $379,072,000 after purchasing an additional 906,589 shares during the last quarter. Deutsche Bank AG grew its stake in shares of Qiagen by 9.7% in the 4th quarter. Deutsche Bank AG now owns 7,907,801 shares of the company’s stock valued at $355,614,000 after buying an additional 697,342 shares during the period. Finally, Amundi grew its stake in shares of Qiagen by 4.4% in the 3rd quarter. Amundi now owns 4,290,273 shares of the company’s stock valued at $201,471,000 after buying an additional 181,509 shares during the period. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 70.00% of the company’s stock.

About Qiagen

Qiagen NV (NYSE: QGEN) is a global provider of sample and assay technologies designed to enable molecular testing in the fields of molecular diagnostics, applied testing, academic research and pharmaceutical development. The company’s solutions span the full workflow of nucleic acid and protein analysis, offering customers standardized kits, instruments and software tools that streamline the preparation, detection and quantification of DNA, RNA and proteins.

The company’s product portfolio includes nucleic acid extraction and purification systems, polymerase chain reaction (PCR) reagents and instrumentation, digital PCR platforms, next-generation sequencing (NGS) library‐preparation kits and proteomics solutions.