Qiagen (NYSE:QGEN) Upgraded at Wall Street Zen

Wall Street Zen upgraded shares of Qiagen (NYSE:QGEN) from a hold rating to a buy rating in a research note issued to investors on Saturday.

QGEN has been the subject of several other reports. UBS Group raised their price objective on Qiagen from $48.00 to $50.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Thursday, August 7th. Weiss Ratings reissued a “hold (c+)” rating on shares of Qiagen in a report on Wednesday, October 8th. Barclays set a $53.00 price target on shares of Qiagen and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a report on Thursday, October 2nd. Finally, Cowen reissued a “hold” rating on shares of Qiagen in a research note on Thursday, August 7th. Three investment analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and seven have issued a Hold rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $49.69.

Qiagen Trading Down 2.6%

Shares of Qiagen stock opened at $45.64 on Friday. The company has a quick ratio of 1.35, a current ratio of 1.61 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.25. Qiagen has a 12-month low of $37.63 and a 12-month high of $51.88. The company has a market capitalization of $10.14 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 26.96, a PEG ratio of 2.48 and a beta of 0.66. The firm’s 50-day moving average price is $46.75 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $46.46.

Qiagen (NYSE:QGEN) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, August 5th. The company reported $0.60 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, hitting the consensus estimate of $0.60. Qiagen had a net margin of 18.30% and a return on equity of 14.77%. The business had revenue of $533.54 million for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $523.97 million. During the same quarter last year, the business posted $0.55 EPS. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was up 7.7% on a year-over-year basis. On average, analysts forecast that Qiagen will post 2.26 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Institutional Trading of Qiagen

Several institutional investors have recently modified their holdings of the business. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD boosted its holdings in Qiagen by 3,030.9% in the first quarter. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD now owns 4,470,728 shares of the company’s stock valued at $179,501,000 after acquiring an additional 4,327,934 shares during the last quarter. Norges Bank acquired a new position in shares of Qiagen in the 2nd quarter worth approximately $158,728,000. Wellington Management Group LLP boosted its stake in shares of Qiagen by 12.2% in the 1st quarter. Wellington Management Group LLP now owns 24,438,441 shares of the company’s stock valued at $972,191,000 after purchasing an additional 2,656,136 shares during the last quarter. Deutsche Bank AG increased its position in shares of Qiagen by 57.5% during the first quarter. Deutsche Bank AG now owns 4,491,131 shares of the company’s stock worth $180,319,000 after buying an additional 1,639,621 shares during the period. Finally, Nuveen LLC bought a new position in Qiagen during the first quarter worth $44,078,000. Institutional investors own 70.00% of the company’s stock.

About Qiagen

QIAGEN NV is a holding company, which engages in the provision of Sample to Insight solutions that enable customers to gain valuable molecular insights from samples containing the building blocks of life. The company sample technologies isolate and process DNA, RNA, and proteins from blood, tissue, and other materials.