Open Text Co. (NASDAQ:OTEX) Short Interest Up 37.9% in February

Open Text Co. (NASDAQ:OTEX) (TSE:OTC) saw a large growth in short interest in February. As of February 28th, there was short interest totalling 7,390,000 shares, a growth of 37.9% from the February 13th total of 5,360,000 shares. Approximately 2.9% of the company’s shares are short sold. Based on an average trading volume of 972,800 shares, the days-to-cover ratio is presently 7.6 days.

Institutional Trading of Open Text

Several hedge funds have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the business. Norges Bank bought a new position in shares of Open Text during the fourth quarter valued at about $93,216,000. Arrowstreet Capital Limited Partnership raised its stake in shares of Open Text by 75.9% during the fourth quarter. Arrowstreet Capital Limited Partnership now owns 5,994,675 shares of the software maker’s stock valued at $169,555,000 after acquiring an additional 2,586,549 shares during the last quarter. JARISLOWSKY FRASER Ltd raised its stake in shares of Open Text by 11.8% during the fourth quarter. JARISLOWSKY FRASER Ltd now owns 18,547,256 shares of the software maker’s stock valued at $522,879,000 after acquiring an additional 1,957,695 shares during the last quarter. Criteria Caixa S.A.U. bought a new position in shares of Open Text during the fourth quarter valued at about $32,890,000. Finally, Brandes Investment Partners LP raised its stake in shares of Open Text by 29.2% during the fourth quarter. Brandes Investment Partners LP now owns 4,504,139 shares of the software maker’s stock valued at $127,557,000 after acquiring an additional 1,017,065 shares during the last quarter. 70.37% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Open Text Price Performance

Open Text stock traded down $0.05 during midday trading on Monday, reaching $26.01. 834,294 shares of the stock were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 742,021. The company’s fifty day moving average is $27.69 and its 200-day moving average is $29.87. The firm has a market cap of $6.87 billion, a PE ratio of 10.57 and a beta of 1.17. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.50, a quick ratio of 0.87 and a current ratio of 0.87. Open Text has a 52 week low of $24.86 and a 52 week high of $40.55.

Open Text (NASDAQ:OTEX) (TSE:OTC) last announced its earnings results on Thursday, February 6th. The software maker reported $1.02 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.92 by $0.10. Open Text had a net margin of 12.21% and a return on equity of 23.23%. On average, sell-side analysts forecast that Open Text will post 3.45 EPS for the current year.

Open Text Increases Dividend

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, March 21st. Shareholders of record on Friday, March 7th will be paid a $0.2625 dividend. The ex-dividend date is Friday, March 7th. This is an increase from Open Text’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.26. This represents a $1.05 annualized dividend and a yield of 4.04%. Open Text’s payout ratio is currently 42.68%.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several analysts have recently weighed in on OTEX shares. UBS Group started coverage on shares of Open Text in a research note on Tuesday, December 17th. They issued a “neutral” rating and a $32.00 price objective for the company. TD Securities decreased their price target on shares of Open Text from $38.00 to $35.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research note on Sunday, February 9th. StockNews.com lowered shares of Open Text from a “strong-buy” rating to a “buy” rating in a research note on Monday, January 27th. Royal Bank of Canada decreased their price target on shares of Open Text from $33.00 to $31.00 and set a “sector perform” rating for the company in a research note on Friday, February 7th. Finally, Barclays boosted their price target on shares of Open Text from $34.00 to $36.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Friday, February 7th. Nine equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and four have given a buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $35.18.

About Open Text

Open Text Corporation provides information management software and solutions. The company offers content services, which includes content collaboration and intelligent capture to records management, collaboration, e-signatures, and archiving; and operates experience cloud platform that provides customer experience and web content management, digital asset management, customer analytics, AI and insights, e-discovery, digital fax, omnichannel communications, secure messaging, and voice of customer, as well as customer journey, testing, and segmentation.