AIA Group Ltd Grows Stake in Weibo Corporation $WB

AIA Group Ltd raised its holdings in shares of Weibo Corporation (NASDAQ:WB) by 229.7% during the first quarter, according to the company in its most recent disclosure with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The institutional investor owned 103,579 shares of the information services provider’s stock after purchasing an additional 72,159 shares during the period. AIA Group Ltd’s holdings in Weibo were worth $906,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Several other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also recently made changes to their positions in WB. AQR Capital Management LLC purchased a new stake in Weibo in the first quarter valued at about $117,000. JPMorgan Chase & Co. increased its holdings in shares of Weibo by 497.1% during the second quarter. JPMorgan Chase & Co. now owns 720,348 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $6,865,000 after acquiring an additional 599,700 shares in the last quarter. Marshall Wace LLP acquired a new position in shares of Weibo during the second quarter valued at about $2,502,000. Daiwa Securities Group Inc. purchased a new position in shares of Weibo in the 2nd quarter valued at approximately $61,000. Finally, Raymond James Financial Inc. raised its position in shares of Weibo by 139.5% in the 2nd quarter. Raymond James Financial Inc. now owns 47,852 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $456,000 after purchasing an additional 27,868 shares during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 68.77% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

Several research firms have weighed in on WB. Zacks Research downgraded shares of Weibo from a “hold” rating to a “strong sell” rating in a research report on Tuesday, June 9th. Weiss Ratings cut shares of Weibo from a “hold (c)” rating to a “sell (d+)” rating in a report on Monday, April 27th. Finally, Jefferies Financial Group reiterated a “buy” rating and set a $9.80 price objective on shares of Weibo in a research note on Thursday, May 28th. Two equities research analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and two have issued a Sell rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $11.90.

Weibo Trading Up 3.2%

Weibo stock opened at $8.00 on Tuesday. The company has a quick ratio of 3.02, a current ratio of 3.02 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.48. Weibo Corporation has a 52 week low of $7.09 and a 52 week high of $12.96. The company has a market capitalization of $1.96 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 5.59, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 4.66 and a beta of 0.21. The stock has a 50-day moving average price of $7.74 and a 200 day moving average price of $8.97.

Weibo (NASDAQ:WB) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, May 28th. The information services provider reported $0.34 earnings per share for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $0.36 by ($0.02). The business had revenue of $421.33 million during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $416.76 million. Weibo had a return on equity of 9.90% and a net margin of 21.15%.Weibo’s quarterly revenue was up 6.1% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter last year, the company posted $0.45 EPS. Sell-side analysts anticipate that Weibo Corporation will post 1.26 EPS for the current year.

Weibo Company Profile

Weibo Corporation operates one of China’s leading social media and microblogging platforms under the brand name Weibo. Launched in August 2009 by Sina Corporation, Weibo enables users to create, share and engage with short-form posts in real time. The platform supports text, images, videos and live streams, and offers features such as trending topics, hashtag campaigns and public discussion forums to facilitate user interaction and content discovery.

Weibo’s product suite extends beyond basic social networking to include digital content services such as live streaming, online games, value-added messaging and e-commerce integrations.