Stock Traders Buy High Volume of Call Options on GlobalFoundries (NASDAQ:GFS)

GlobalFoundries Inc. (NASDAQ:GFS) saw unusually large options trading on Thursday. Traders acquired 11,130 call options on the company. This is an increase of 53% compared to the average daily volume of 7,268 call options.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several research analysts have recently issued reports on GFS shares. Cantor Fitzgerald raised GlobalFoundries from a “neutral” rating to an “overweight” rating and lifted their price target for the stock from $50.00 to $80.00 in a research note on Monday, May 4th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. raised their target price on shares of GlobalFoundries from $45.00 to $70.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a report on Wednesday, May 6th. Morgan Stanley lifted their target price on shares of GlobalFoundries from $58.00 to $65.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a research report on Wednesday, May 6th. Citigroup upped their price target on shares of GlobalFoundries from $49.00 to $70.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a report on Wednesday, May 6th. Finally, Arete Research set a $95.00 price target on shares of GlobalFoundries in a research report on Wednesday, June 10th. Nine equities research analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating, ten have given a Hold rating and one has assigned a Sell rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, GlobalFoundries has an average rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $73.29.

Insider Buying and Selling

In related news, insider Michael James Hogan sold 2,800 shares of the stock in a transaction on Wednesday, June 24th. The stock was sold at an average price of $83.53, for a total transaction of $233,884.00. Following the completion of the sale, the insider directly owned 3,745 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $312,819.85. This trade represents a 42.78% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this link. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Also, insider Samak L. Azar sold 335 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Thursday, June 18th. The stock was sold at an average price of $83.35, for a total transaction of $27,922.25. Following the completion of the sale, the insider owned 13,819 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $1,151,813.65. This trade represents a 2.37% 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. Insiders have sold a total of 24,475 shares of company stock valued at $1,621,766 over the last ninety days.

Institutional Trading of GlobalFoundries

A number of institutional investors and hedge funds have recently modified their holdings of GFS. Invesco Ltd. grew its position in GlobalFoundries by 7.9% in the 3rd quarter. Invesco Ltd. now owns 2,962,385 shares of the company’s stock worth $106,172,000 after purchasing an additional 217,866 shares during the last quarter. AQR Capital Management LLC lifted its position in GlobalFoundries by 9.9% in the fourth quarter. AQR Capital Management LLC now owns 2,865,046 shares of the company’s stock worth $100,047,000 after purchasing an additional 257,254 shares during the period. Bessemer Group Inc. lifted its position in GlobalFoundries by 8,275,141.2% in the first quarter. Bessemer Group Inc. now owns 2,813,582 shares of the company’s stock worth $125,147,000 after purchasing an additional 2,813,548 shares during the period. First Trust Advisors LP boosted its stake in GlobalFoundries by 15.2% during the 3rd quarter. First Trust Advisors LP now owns 2,659,454 shares of the company’s stock valued at $95,315,000 after purchasing an additional 350,743 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Marshall Wace LLP boosted its stake in GlobalFoundries by 126.0% during the 4th quarter. Marshall Wace LLP now owns 2,382,003 shares of the company’s stock valued at $83,180,000 after purchasing an additional 1,328,129 shares in the last quarter.

GlobalFoundries Stock Down 7.2%

Shares of GlobalFoundries stock opened at $79.91 on Friday. GlobalFoundries has a twelve month low of $31.51 and a twelve month high of $92.55. The stock has a market cap of $43.85 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 57.49, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.04 and a beta of 1.77. The company has a current ratio of 2.59, a quick ratio of 1.87 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.13. The company has a fifty day moving average price of $74.83 and a 200 day moving average price of $54.10.

GlobalFoundries (NASDAQ:GFS) last released its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, May 5th. The company reported $0.40 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.35 by $0.05. GlobalFoundries had a net margin of 11.40% and a return on equity of 6.85%. The firm had revenue of $1.63 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $1.63 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm posted $0.34 EPS. The firm’s quarterly revenue was up 3.1% on a year-over-year basis. GlobalFoundries has set its Q2 2026 guidance at 0.250-0.350 EPS. Equities research analysts forecast that GlobalFoundries will post 1.38 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

GlobalFoundries Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Tuesday, July 14th. Shareholders of record on Wednesday, June 24th will be issued a $0.12 dividend. This represents a $0.48 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 0.6%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Wednesday, June 24th. GlobalFoundries’s payout ratio is currently 34.53%.

About GlobalFoundries

GlobalFoundries, Inc (NASDAQ: GFS) is a leading contract semiconductor manufacturer that provides wafer fabrication and related services to semiconductor companies and systems manufacturers. The company operates as a pure-play foundry, producing integrated circuits across a range of process technologies for customers in markets such as automotive, communications, consumer electronics, industrial, and aerospace. Its service offering spans process development, manufacturing, test and packaging support, and design enablement including process design kits (PDKs) and intellectual property (IP) libraries to help customers bring designs to production.

GlobalFoundries focuses on a portfolio of differentiated and specialty process nodes, offering technologies for radio-frequency (RF) and wireless, analog and mixed-signal, power management, embedded non-volatile memory, and silicon-on-insulator (SOI) process families.