Insider Selling: Ginkgo Bioworks (NYSE:DNA) Insider Sells $672,313.95 in Stock

Ginkgo Bioworks Holdings, Inc. (NYSE:DNA) insider Jason Kelly sold 97,015 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Wednesday, April 8th. The stock was sold at an average price of $6.93, for a total value of $672,313.95. Following the transaction, the insider directly owned 426,250 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $2,953,912.50. The trade was a 18.54% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available through this hyperlink. The sale was made to cover tax withholding obligations related to the vesting of equity awards.

Ginkgo Bioworks Stock Performance

Ginkgo Bioworks stock opened at $6.46 on Monday. The stock has a fifty day moving average of $7.63 and a two-hundred day moving average of $9.48. The company has a market capitalization of $399.76 million, a price-to-earnings ratio of -1.14 and a beta of 1.56. Ginkgo Bioworks Holdings, Inc. has a fifty-two week low of $5.37 and a fifty-two week high of $17.58.

Ginkgo Bioworks (NYSE:DNA) last released its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, February 26th. The company reported ($1.42) earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of ($1.80) by $0.38. The company had revenue of $33.40 million during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $37.57 million. Ginkgo Bioworks had a negative return on equity of 52.82% and a negative net margin of 183.81%. On average, analysts forecast that Ginkgo Bioworks Holdings, Inc. will post -10.02 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Ginkgo Bioworks

Several hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in DNA. AQR Capital Management LLC boosted its holdings in shares of Ginkgo Bioworks by 322.6% during the first quarter. AQR Capital Management LLC now owns 158,939 shares of the company’s stock worth $906,000 after purchasing an additional 121,326 shares during the last quarter. Millennium Management LLC boosted its holdings in shares of Ginkgo Bioworks by 113.1% during the first quarter. Millennium Management LLC now owns 1,427,600 shares of the company’s stock worth $8,137,000 after purchasing an additional 757,535 shares during the last quarter. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. boosted its holdings in shares of Ginkgo Bioworks by 25.4% during the first quarter. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. now owns 686,767 shares of the company’s stock worth $3,915,000 after purchasing an additional 139,126 shares during the last quarter. Acadian Asset Management LLC acquired a new stake in shares of Ginkgo Bioworks during the first quarter worth $120,000. Finally, Rhumbline Advisers acquired a new stake in shares of Ginkgo Bioworks during the second quarter worth $666,000. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 78.63% of the company’s stock.

Key Ginkgo Bioworks News

Here are the key news stories impacting Ginkgo Bioworks this week:

• Positive Sentiment: March short interest fell sharply — short interest totaled 6,146,646 shares as of March 31, down 23.2% from 8,004,118 on March 15; roughly 11.0% of the float is sold short and the days-to-cover is ~5.2. Reduced short exposure can remove a headwind and support the stock.
• Negative Sentiment: Large insider sales by the CEO: Jason R. Kelly sold 97,015 shares on April 8 (avg $6.93) and 109,767 shares on April 9 (avg $6.40), totaling ~206,782 shares (~$1.37M) and materially reducing his holdings. The filings say the sales were to cover tax withholding on vested equity. Jason R. Kelly Form 4
• Negative Sentiment: Other insiders/major holders also sold small blocks (Reshma P. Shetty and Barry Canton each sold ~13k shares on April 8–9 at similar prices). These rounds of sales were likewise disclosed as tax-withholding-related. Reshma’s filing: Reshma P. Shetty Form 4; Barry Canton’s filing: Barry Canton Form 4

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

Several equities analysts have weighed in on DNA shares. TD Cowen dropped their price target on Ginkgo Bioworks from $14.00 to $12.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research report on Thursday, January 8th. Wall Street Zen raised Ginkgo Bioworks from a “sell” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Saturday. Weiss Ratings reissued a “sell (d-)” rating on shares of Ginkgo Bioworks in a research report on Wednesday, January 21st. Finally, BTIG Research dropped their price target on Ginkgo Bioworks from $9.00 to $5.00 and set a “sell” rating for the company in a research report on Thursday, March 12th. One research analyst has rated the stock with a Buy rating and two have issued a Sell rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock currently has a consensus rating of “Reduce” and a consensus target price of $8.50.

About Ginkgo Bioworks

Ginkgo Bioworks, Inc is a synthetic biology company that designs custom microbes for customers across a range of industries. Utilizing a proprietary organism foundry platform, the company engineers cells to produce high-value chemicals, enzymes, and other biological materials. By integrating automation, data analytics and machine learning, Ginkgo Bioworks seeks to accelerate the development of biologically derived solutions at industrial scale.

The company’s services span the entire development cycle, from genetic design and strain optimization to fermentation and downstream processing.