Planet Labs PBC (NYSE:PL) Shares Gap Up After Analyst Upgrade

Planet Labs PBC (NYSE:PL)’s stock price gapped up prior to trading on Friday after Morgan Stanley raised their price target on the stock from $4.50 to $20.00. The stock had previously closed at $17.47, but opened at $18.44. Morgan Stanley currently has an equal weight rating on the stock. Planet Labs PBC shares last traded at $18.1260, with a volume of 8,455,444 shares trading hands.

A number of other equities analysts have also recently issued reports on PL. Citizens Jmp cut shares of Planet Labs PBC from an “outperform” rating to a “market perform” rating in a research report on Tuesday, October 21st. Northland Securities set a $17.00 target price on Planet Labs PBC in a research report on Thursday. Citigroup started coverage on shares of Planet Labs PBC in a research note on Thursday. They set a “buy” rating and a $19.00 price target for the company. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft raised their price objective on shares of Planet Labs PBC from $16.00 to $17.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Thursday. Finally, Weiss Ratings reissued a “sell (d-)” rating on shares of Planet Labs PBC in a research report on Wednesday, October 8th. Eight investment analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating, four have issued a Hold rating and one has issued a Sell rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $14.96.

Insider Activity

In related news, insider Robert H. Schingler sold 81,656 shares of Planet Labs PBC stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, October 13th. The shares were sold at an average price of $15.50, for a total value of $1,265,668.00. Following the sale, the insider owned 1,288,843 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $19,977,066.50. The trade was a 5.96% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. 17.53% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.

Institutional Trading of Planet Labs PBC

Several hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in the company. Allworth Financial LP increased its holdings in Planet Labs PBC by 66.5% in the 3rd quarter. Allworth Financial LP now owns 30,162 shares of the company’s stock worth $392,000 after acquiring an additional 12,044 shares during the last quarter. Swiss Life Asset Management Ltd purchased a new position in shares of Planet Labs PBC in the third quarter valued at $134,000. Cambria Investment Management L.P. increased its position in shares of Planet Labs PBC by 25.0% during the third quarter. Cambria Investment Management L.P. now owns 142,743 shares of the company’s stock valued at $1,853,000 after buying an additional 28,548 shares during the period. CIBC Bancorp USA Inc. purchased a new stake in Planet Labs PBC in the 3rd quarter worth approximately $323,000. Finally, Ariadne Wealth Management LP grew its position in Planet Labs PBC by 8.8% during the third quarter. Ariadne Wealth Management LP now owns 11,202 shares of the company’s stock worth $145,000 after buying an additional 905 shares in the last quarter. 41.71% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Planet Labs PBC Price Performance

The business’s 50 day moving average is $13.12 and its two-hundred day moving average is $9.30. The firm has a market capitalization of $5.62 billion, a PE ratio of -43.45 and a beta of 2.00. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.28, a current ratio of 4.00 and a quick ratio of 1.75.

Planet Labs PBC (NYSE:PL) last released its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, December 10th. The company reported ($0.19) earnings per share for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of ($0.02) by ($0.17). The firm had revenue of $81.25 million for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $72.02 million. Planet Labs PBC had a negative net margin of 45.87% and a negative return on equity of 31.01%. The business’s revenue for the quarter was up 32.6% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, research analysts anticipate that Planet Labs PBC will post -0.37 EPS for the current year.

About Planet Labs PBC

Planet Labs PBC engages in the design, construction, and launch constellations of satellites with the intent of providing high cadence geospatial data delivered to customers through an online platform worldwide. The company’s platform offers planet monitoring, basemap, tasking, apps, and application programming interfaces, as well as analytics and planetary variables.