StoneCo Ltd. (NASDAQ:STNE) Receives $20.00 Average PT from Brokerages

Shares of StoneCo Ltd. (NASDAQ:STNE) have been assigned a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” from the nine brokerages that are covering the stock, Marketbeat Ratings reports. Four equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and five have given a buy rating to the company. The average twelve-month price target among brokerages that have issued ratings on the stock in the last year is $20.00.

STNE has been the subject of several recent analyst reports. Santander downgraded shares of StoneCo from an “outperform” rating to a “neutral” rating in a research note on Thursday, January 29th. UBS Group reduced their target price on StoneCo from $19.50 to $19.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a report on Wednesday, March 11th. Weiss Ratings upgraded shares of StoneCo from a “sell (d+)” rating to a “hold (c)” rating in a report on Thursday, March 5th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. cut their price objective on shares of StoneCo from $21.00 to $20.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a report on Wednesday, April 15th. Finally, The Goldman Sachs Group cut their price objective on shares of StoneCo from $22.00 to $19.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a report on Tuesday, January 27th.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On StoneCo

Several institutional investors and hedge funds have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the stock. Principal Financial Group Inc. boosted its holdings in StoneCo by 22.5% in the first quarter. Principal Financial Group Inc. now owns 18,182 shares of the company’s stock worth $257,000 after purchasing an additional 3,340 shares during the last quarter. Hsbc Holdings PLC raised its position in StoneCo by 286.6% in the first quarter. Hsbc Holdings PLC now owns 163,065 shares of the company’s stock worth $2,298,000 after acquiring an additional 120,883 shares during the period. Summit Securities Group LLC bought a new position in StoneCo in the first quarter worth approximately $61,000. Sumitomo Mitsui Trust Group Inc. raised its position in StoneCo by 3.9% in the first quarter. Sumitomo Mitsui Trust Group Inc. now owns 499,409 shares of the company’s stock worth $7,052,000 after acquiring an additional 18,525 shares during the period. Finally, BRC Global BAH Investments Ltd. raised its position in StoneCo by 32.7% in the first quarter. BRC Global BAH Investments Ltd. now owns 7,580,409 shares of the company’s stock worth $107,035,000 after acquiring an additional 1,867,018 shares during the period. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 73.19% of the company’s stock.

StoneCo Stock Performance

StoneCo stock opened at $11.08 on Friday. The company has a market capitalization of $2.76 billion, a PE ratio of 7.24, a P/E/G ratio of 0.23 and a beta of 1.73. The firm has a fifty day simple moving average of $14.20 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $15.53. The company has a quick ratio of 1.37, a current ratio of 1.37 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.81. StoneCo has a twelve month low of $10.74 and a twelve month high of $19.95.

StoneCo (NASDAQ:STNE) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, March 3rd. The company reported $0.50 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.48 by $0.02. The firm had revenue of $675.42 million during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $704.26 million. StoneCo had a net margin of 15.38% and a return on equity of 21.55%. Research analysts expect that StoneCo will post 1.99 EPS for the current year.

StoneCo Announces Dividend

The business also recently announced a special dividend, which was paid on Monday, May 4th. Investors of record on Friday, April 24th were issued a $2.53 dividend. The ex-dividend date was Friday, April 24th.

About StoneCo

StoneCo Ltd., commonly known as Stone, is a Brazilian financial technology company that provides integrated digital payment solutions and related financial services to merchants. Through its cloud-based platform, Stone enables businesses of all sizes to accept a variety of payment methods, including point-of-sale (POS) terminals, mobile card readers and e-commerce gateways. In addition to payment acceptance, the company offers value-added services such as working capital loans, digital banking products and automated billing tools designed to help merchants manage cash flow and streamline operations.

Since its founding in 2012 by André Street and Eduardo Pontes, Stone has focused on serving over half a million merchants across Brazil’s retail, restaurant and services sectors.