Vaxcyte, Inc. (NASDAQ:PCVX) Receives Average Recommendation of “Moderate Buy” from Analysts

Vaxcyte, Inc. (NASDAQ:PCVX) has been assigned an average rating of “Moderate Buy” from the eight research firms that are presently covering the stock, MarketBeat.com reports. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell recommendation, one has assigned a hold recommendation and six have issued a buy recommendation on the company. The average 12 month target price among analysts that have updated their coverage on the stock in the last year is $86.00.

PCVX has been the subject of a number of analyst reports. Wall Street Zen downgraded shares of Vaxcyte from a “sell” rating to a “strong sell” rating in a report on Tuesday, April 28th. Weiss Ratings reissued a “sell (d-)” rating on shares of Vaxcyte in a research note on Monday.

Vaxcyte Trading Up 1.9%

Shares of NASDAQ PCVX opened at $59.83 on Friday. The firm has a market capitalization of $8.64 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of -8.70 and a beta of 1.22. Vaxcyte has a one year low of $29.08 and a one year high of $65.00. The business has a fifty day simple moving average of $52.16 and a 200 day simple moving average of $53.89.

Vaxcyte (NASDAQ:PCVX) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, May 6th. The company reported ($2.30) earnings per share for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of ($1.74) by ($0.56). During the same period in the previous year, the business posted ($1.04) EPS. On average, research analysts anticipate that Vaxcyte will post -7.91 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Vaxcyte news, CFO Andrew Guggenhime sold 10,000 shares of Vaxcyte stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, July 6th. The stock was sold at an average price of $57.28, for a total transaction of $572,800.00. Following the sale, the chief financial officer directly owned 104,395 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $5,979,745.60. The trade was a 8.74% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this link. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Also, CEO Grant Pickering sold 22,461 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, June 18th. The shares were sold at an average price of $52.50, for a total value of $1,179,202.50. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer owned 474,703 shares in the company, valued at approximately $24,921,907.50. This represents a 4.52% decrease in their ownership of the stock. Additional details regarding this sale are available in the official SEC disclosure. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Insiders sold a total of 75,448 shares of company stock worth $4,091,197 over the last quarter. Company insiders own 3.30% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Trading of Vaxcyte

Several institutional investors have recently bought and sold shares of PCVX. JPMorgan Chase & Co. boosted its holdings in shares of Vaxcyte by 30.6% in the 3rd quarter. JPMorgan Chase & Co. now owns 1,565,036 shares of the company’s stock worth $56,373,000 after acquiring an additional 366,266 shares in the last quarter. Pivotal bioVenture Partners Investment Advisor LLC increased its holdings in Vaxcyte by 5.2% during the 3rd quarter. Pivotal bioVenture Partners Investment Advisor LLC now owns 1,372,425 shares of the company’s stock valued at $49,435,000 after purchasing an additional 67,300 shares in the last quarter. HighVista Strategies LLC increased its holdings in Vaxcyte by 159.4% during the 3rd quarter. HighVista Strategies LLC now owns 86,802 shares of the company’s stock valued at $3,127,000 after purchasing an additional 53,345 shares in the last quarter. Bridgefront Capital LLC raised its position in Vaxcyte by 127.2% in the 3rd quarter. Bridgefront Capital LLC now owns 24,325 shares of the company’s stock valued at $876,000 after purchasing an additional 13,617 shares during the last quarter. Finally, NEXTBio Capital Management LP acquired a new position in Vaxcyte in the fourth quarter worth $4,406,000. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 96.78% of the company’s stock.

Vaxcyte Company Profile

Vaxcyte, Inc (NASDAQ: PCVX) is a clinical-stage biotechnology company focused on developing a new generation of preventive vaccines aimed at combating serious bacterial diseases. Headquartered in San Carlos, California, Vaxcyte leverages proprietary conjugation technologies to design and manufacture multivalent vaccines targeting pathogens for which there remain significant unmet medical needs. The company’s platform is intended to streamline the production of conjugate vaccines by improving antigen presentation and broadening strain coverage compared with conventional approaches.

Vaxcyte’s lead candidate, VAX-24, is a 24-valent pneumococcal conjugate vaccine designed to protect against 24 serotypes of Streptococcus pneumoniae.