HighTower Advisors LLC Cuts Stake in Illumina, Inc. $ILMN

HighTower Advisors LLC reduced its holdings in shares of Illumina, Inc. (NASDAQ:ILMN) by 11.6% during the 4th quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The firm owned 40,031 shares of the life sciences company’s stock after selling 5,234 shares during the period. HighTower Advisors LLC’s holdings in Illumina were worth $5,250,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Several other large investors have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in ILMN. Empowered Funds LLC increased its stake in Illumina by 113.7% during the 1st quarter. Empowered Funds LLC now owns 9,284 shares of the life sciences company’s stock worth $737,000 after buying an additional 4,940 shares during the period. Sivia Capital Partners LLC purchased a new stake in Illumina during the 2nd quarter worth approximately $621,000. CW Advisors LLC purchased a new stake in shares of Illumina in the 2nd quarter valued at approximately $275,000. Marshall Wace LLP increased its position in shares of Illumina by 49.0% in the 2nd quarter. Marshall Wace LLP now owns 59,645 shares of the life sciences company’s stock valued at $5,691,000 after purchasing an additional 19,618 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Cresset Asset Management LLC increased its position in shares of Illumina by 30.9% in the 2nd quarter. Cresset Asset Management LLC now owns 7,404 shares of the life sciences company’s stock valued at $706,000 after purchasing an additional 1,748 shares during the last quarter. 89.42% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of brokerages have commented on ILMN. Robert W. Baird set a $137.00 price objective on shares of Illumina in a research report on Friday, February 6th. Citigroup increased their price objective on shares of Illumina from $80.00 to $95.00 and gave the company a “sell” rating in a research report on Monday, May 4th. Barclays increased their price objective on shares of Illumina from $110.00 to $122.00 and gave the company an “underweight” rating in a research report on Friday, May 1st. Daiwa Securities Group raised shares of Illumina from a “neutral” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $155.00 price objective on the stock in a research report on Thursday, May 14th. Finally, Wall Street Zen downgraded shares of Illumina from a “strong-buy” rating to a “buy” rating in a research report on Saturday, May 9th. Seven investment analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating, nine have assigned a Hold rating and two have issued a Sell rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company presently has an average rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $137.75.

Key Headlines Impacting Illumina

Here are the key news stories impacting Illumina this week:

• Positive Sentiment: Illumina and SPT Labtech launched fireflyGO, a new automation platform designed to make targeted oncology research faster, simpler, and more scalable. The product is integrated with Illumina’s MiSeq i100 Series and could help broaden adoption of its sequencing workflow. Illumina and SPT Labtech unveil fireflyGO, enabling faster, simpler targeted oncology research
• Positive Sentiment: Illumina also introduced a distributed whole-genome sequencing solution for MRD research, expanding its oncology portfolio and making it easier for more labs to adopt molecular residual disease testing in clinical research. That supports the company’s long-term growth narrative in precision oncology. Illumina introduces the first distributed whole-genome sequencing solution for highly sensitive MRD research
• Neutral Sentiment: A separate marketwide report noted that the broader stock market reached fresh highs on upbeat macro news. While this may be helping overall sentiment, it is not specific to Illumina’s business. Dow Jones Futures: Stock Market Hits Highs On U.S.-Iran Deal; Dell Surges On Earnings
• Neutral Sentiment: One article flagged Illumina as a strong momentum stock, which may reinforce positive trader sentiment, but it did not include new fundamental information. Here’s Why Illumina (ILMN) is a Strong Momentum Stock

Illumina Trading Up 5.7%

Shares of Illumina stock opened at $158.70 on Friday. The company has a fifty day simple moving average of $132.92 and a 200-day simple moving average of $131.80. Illumina, Inc. has a 12-month low of $78.79 and a 12-month high of $158.79. The company has a current ratio of 1.75, a quick ratio of 1.36 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.56. The stock has a market cap of $24.01 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 28.85, a PEG ratio of 2.49 and a beta of 1.42.

Illumina (NASDAQ:ILMN) last issued its earnings results on Thursday, April 30th. The life sciences company reported $1.15 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.05 by $0.10. Illumina had a net margin of 19.42% and a return on equity of 31.01%. The business had revenue of $1.09 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $1.07 billion. During the same quarter in the prior year, the business posted $0.97 EPS. The company’s revenue for the quarter was up 4.8% on a year-over-year basis. Illumina has set its FY 2026 guidance at 5.150-5.300 EPS. On average, equities analysts forecast that Illumina, Inc. will post 5.2 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Insider Buying and Selling at Illumina

In other news, Director Keith A. Meister sold 225,067 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Wednesday, May 13th. The shares were sold at an average price of $145.55, for a total value of $32,758,501.85. Following the completion of the transaction, the director owned 3,604,441 shares in the company, valued at approximately $524,626,387.55. This represents a 5.88% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is accessible through this link. Also, SVP Christensen Jakob Wedel sold 700 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Wednesday, May 6th. The shares were sold at an average price of $139.04, for a total transaction of $97,328.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the senior vice president owned 15,056 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $2,093,386.24. The trade was a 4.44% decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale is available in the SEC filing. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. In the last 90 days, insiders sold 330,160 shares of company stock valued at $48,028,308. Company insiders own 2.90% of the company’s stock.

About Illumina

Illumina, Inc (NASDAQ: ILMN) is a global life sciences company that develops, manufactures and markets integrated systems for the analysis of genetic variation and function. Headquartered in San Diego, California and founded in 1998, Illumina offers a range of sequencing and array-based technologies used by academic researchers, clinical laboratories, pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies, consumer genomics firms and agricultural researchers to enable discovery, translational research and clinical applications.

The company’s product portfolio includes next-generation sequencing (NGS) platforms and associated consumables, microarrays for genotyping and methylation analysis, library preparation kits and targeted assays.