Wall Street Zen Upgrades Knowles (NYSE:KN) to “Buy”

Knowles (NYSE:KN) was upgraded by equities research analysts at Wall Street Zen from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a research report issued to clients and investors on Friday.

Several other research firms have also recently commented on KN. Robert W. Baird lifted their target price on Knowles from $18.00 to $22.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note on Friday, April 25th. Craig Hallum raised Knowles from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating and set a $17.00 target price for the company in a research note on Monday, April 7th.

Knowles Trading Up 0.7%

KN stock opened at $18.03 on Friday. The business has a fifty day moving average price of $16.64 and a 200 day moving average price of $17.29. Knowles has a fifty-two week low of $12.19 and a fifty-two week high of $20.86. The stock has a market capitalization of $1.57 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of -6.68 and a beta of 1.41. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.16, a current ratio of 2.02 and a quick ratio of 1.30.

Knowles (NYSE:KN) last released its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, April 24th. The communications equipment provider reported $0.18 earnings per share for the quarter, meeting analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.18. Knowles had a positive return on equity of 6.35% and a negative net margin of 38.96%. The firm had revenue of $132.20 million during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $128.95 million. During the same period last year, the firm posted $0.18 EPS. The business’s revenue was down .8% on a year-over-year basis.

Insider Activity

In related news, SVP Raymond D. Cabrera sold 5,545 shares of Knowles stock in a transaction on Thursday, May 15th. The stock was sold at an average price of $17.25, for a total transaction of $95,651.25. Following the completion of the sale, the senior vice president now directly owns 111,286 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $1,919,683.50. The trade was a 4.75% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this link. Insiders own 2.54% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Several hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in KN. Versant Capital Management Inc lifted its holdings in Knowles by 725.6% during the first quarter. Versant Capital Management Inc now owns 1,643 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock worth $25,000 after acquiring an additional 1,444 shares in the last quarter. EverSource Wealth Advisors LLC lifted its holdings in Knowles by 46.9% during the fourth quarter. EverSource Wealth Advisors LLC now owns 2,095 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock worth $42,000 after acquiring an additional 669 shares in the last quarter. Sterling Capital Management LLC lifted its holdings in Knowles by 835.5% during the fourth quarter. Sterling Capital Management LLC now owns 2,741 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock worth $55,000 after acquiring an additional 2,448 shares in the last quarter. Meeder Asset Management Inc. lifted its holdings in shares of Knowles by 47.0% in the first quarter. Meeder Asset Management Inc. now owns 3,703 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock valued at $56,000 after purchasing an additional 1,184 shares in the last quarter. Finally, BI Asset Management Fondsmaeglerselskab A S bought a new stake in shares of Knowles in the first quarter valued at about $106,000. 96.35% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

About Knowles

Knowles Corporation offers capacitors, radio frequency (RF) filtering products, balanced armature speakers, micro-acoustic microphones, and audio solutions in Asia, the United States, Europe, other Americas, and internationally. It operates through three segments: Precision Devices (PD); Medtech & Specialty Audio (MSA); and Consumer MEMS Microphones (CMM).