AXQ Capital LP Buys Shares of 4,719 VeriSign, Inc. (NASDAQ:VRSN)

AXQ Capital LP purchased a new stake in shares of VeriSign, Inc. (NASDAQ:VRSN) during the 4th quarter, HoldingsChannel.com reports. The institutional investor purchased 4,719 shares of the information services provider’s stock, valued at approximately $977,000.

Several other institutional investors and hedge funds have also modified their holdings of the stock. Sei Investments Co. grew its holdings in shares of VeriSign by 75.2% during the 4th quarter. Sei Investments Co. now owns 106,766 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $22,096,000 after acquiring an additional 45,830 shares in the last quarter. Mizuho Securities USA LLC boosted its holdings in VeriSign by 43.9% in the fourth quarter. Mizuho Securities USA LLC now owns 7,833 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $1,621,000 after purchasing an additional 2,390 shares in the last quarter. Summit Global Investments bought a new stake in VeriSign in the fourth quarter worth $537,000. Whittier Trust Co. of Nevada Inc. boosted its holdings in VeriSign by 4.6% in the fourth quarter. Whittier Trust Co. of Nevada Inc. now owns 1,469 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $304,000 after purchasing an additional 64 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Teacher Retirement System of Texas boosted its holdings in VeriSign by 89.5% in the fourth quarter. Teacher Retirement System of Texas now owns 155,551 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $32,193,000 after purchasing an additional 73,463 shares in the last quarter. 92.90% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other VeriSign news, SVP John Calys sold 447 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, February 24th. The shares were sold at an average price of $231.75, for a total transaction of $103,592.25. Following the sale, the senior vice president now directly owns 23,735 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $5,500,586.25. This represents a 1.85 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this link. Company insiders own 0.84% of the company’s stock.

VeriSign Stock Performance

Shares of VRSN opened at $244.51 on Friday. VeriSign, Inc. has a 52 week low of $167.05 and a 52 week high of $245.67. The firm has a market capitalization of $23.13 billion, a P/E ratio of 30.56 and a beta of 0.87. The company has a 50-day simple moving average of $226.47 and a 200-day simple moving average of $202.12.

VeriSign (NASDAQ:VRSN) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, February 6th. The information services provider reported $2.00 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, hitting the consensus estimate of $2.00. VeriSign had a net margin of 50.47% and a negative return on equity of 43.01%.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of brokerages recently issued reports on VRSN. Robert W. Baird upgraded shares of VeriSign from a “neutral” rating to an “outperform” rating and upped their price objective for the stock from $200.00 to $250.00 in a report on Monday, December 9th. StockNews.com lowered shares of VeriSign from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Friday. Baird R W raised shares of VeriSign from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Monday, December 9th. Finally, Citigroup upped their price objective on shares of VeriSign from $246.00 to $250.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Tuesday, February 4th.

VeriSign Profile

VeriSign, Inc, together with its subsidiaries, provides domain name registry services and internet infrastructure that enables internet navigation for various recognized domain names worldwide. The company enables the security, stability, and resiliency of internet infrastructure and services, including providing root zone maintainer services, operating two of thirteen internet root servers; and offering registration services and authoritative resolution for the .com and .net domains, which supports global e-commerce.