Harvest Fund Management Co. Ltd Boosts Stake in SkyWest, Inc. (NASDAQ:SKYW)

Harvest Fund Management Co. Ltd grew its stake in shares of SkyWest, Inc. (NASDAQ:SKYW) by 173.6% during the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The institutional investor owned 3,809 shares of the transportation company’s stock after buying an additional 2,417 shares during the period. Harvest Fund Management Co. Ltd’s holdings in SkyWest were worth $199,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Other hedge funds also recently made changes to their positions in the company. GAMMA Investing LLC purchased a new position in SkyWest during the fourth quarter valued at approximately $29,000. Strs Ohio bought a new stake in shares of SkyWest during the 4th quarter valued at $36,000. Salem Investment Counselors Inc. purchased a new position in shares of SkyWest during the 4th quarter valued at $57,000. Migdal Insurance & Financial Holdings Ltd. bought a new position in SkyWest in the 4th quarter worth $60,000. Finally, Headlands Technologies LLC purchased a new stake in SkyWest in the 3rd quarter worth $59,000. 81.30% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

SkyWest Stock Performance

NASDAQ:SKYW opened at $71.35 on Thursday. The company has a market cap of $2.88 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 82.01 and a beta of 1.95. SkyWest, Inc. has a 1 year low of $23.37 and a 1 year high of $74.52. The stock’s 50 day simple moving average is $66.44 and its two-hundred day simple moving average is $54.64. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.21, a current ratio of 0.90 and a quick ratio of 0.80.

SkyWest (NASDAQ:SKYW) last posted its earnings results on Thursday, February 1st. The transportation company reported $0.42 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.11 by $0.31. SkyWest had a net margin of 1.17% and a return on equity of 1.59%. The firm had revenue of $751.80 million during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $758.41 million. During the same period last year, the firm posted ($0.93) earnings per share. SkyWest’s revenue for the quarter was up 10.4% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, equities analysts anticipate that SkyWest, Inc. will post 6.45 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several equities analysts have recently commented on SKYW shares. TheStreet upgraded SkyWest from a “c” rating to a “b-” rating in a research report on Friday, February 2nd. StockNews.com upgraded SkyWest from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a research note on Monday, February 5th. Evercore ISI lifted their price objective on shares of SkyWest from $60.00 to $70.00 and gave the company an “in-line” rating in a research report on Thursday, April 4th. Raymond James boosted their target price on shares of SkyWest from $55.00 to $65.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a report on Friday, February 2nd. Finally, TD Cowen raised shares of SkyWest from a “market perform” rating to an “outperform” rating and raised their target price for the company from $55.00 to $68.00 in a research note on Monday, February 5th. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a hold rating and four have assigned a buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat, the stock has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $62.25.

Insider Activity

In related news, Director James L. Welch sold 2,000 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Friday, March 15th. The shares were sold at an average price of $66.72, for a total value of $133,440.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the director now owns 56,067 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $3,740,790.24. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. Corporate insiders own 2.00% of the company’s stock.

About SkyWest

SkyWest, Inc is the holding company for two scheduled passenger airline operations and an aircraft leasing company. SkyWest’s airline companies provide commercial air service in cities throughout North America with nearly 3,000 daily flights carrying more than 53 million passengers annually. SkyWest Airlines operates through partnerships with United Airlines, Delta Air Lines, American Airlines and Alaska Airlines.