AC Immune (NASDAQ:ACIU) Shares Down 2.7% – Time to Sell?

AC Immune (NASDAQ:ACIU) was down 2.7% during mid-day trading on Monday . The stock traded as low as $2.18 and last traded at $2.19. Approximately 296,576 shares were traded during trading, an increase of 10% from the average daily volume of 270,272 shares. The stock had previously closed at $2.25.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of equities research analysts recently weighed in on the company. BTIG Research restated a “buy” rating and set a $8.00 price objective on shares of AC Immune in a research note on Monday, May 4th. Jefferies Financial Group reiterated a “buy” rating and issued a $7.00 target price on shares of AC Immune in a report on Friday, March 13th. Wall Street Zen raised shares of AC Immune from a “sell” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Saturday, February 28th. Finally, Weiss Ratings cut shares of AC Immune from a “sell (d-)” rating to a “sell (e+)” rating in a report on Friday, May 8th. Two equities research analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating, one has given a Hold rating and one has assigned a Sell rating to the company. According to MarketBeat.com, the company presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $7.50.

AC Immune Trading Down 2.7%

The company has a 50 day moving average of $2.85 and a two-hundred day moving average of $3.00. The stock has a market capitalization of $222.88 million, a PE ratio of -2.67 and a beta of 1.59. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.11, a quick ratio of 1.02 and a current ratio of 0.87.

AC Immune (NASDAQ:ACIU) last released its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, April 30th. The company reported ($0.19) EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of ($0.20) by $0.01. The company had revenue of $1.40 million during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $0.33 million. AC Immune had a negative return on equity of 125.26% and a negative net margin of 1,788.02%. Sell-side analysts predict that AC Immune will post -0.84 EPS for the current year.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other AC Immune news, CEO Andrea Pfeifer sold 10,000 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, May 15th. The shares were sold at an average price of $2.79, for a total transaction of $27,900.00. Following the sale, the chief executive officer owned 3,820,288 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $10,658,603.52. The trade was a 0.26% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this link. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. 4.60% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

Institutional Trading of AC Immune

A number of hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in ACIU. Arrowstreet Capital Limited Partnership lifted its position in AC Immune by 8.0% during the first quarter. Arrowstreet Capital Limited Partnership now owns 405,658 shares of the company’s stock valued at $1,116,000 after purchasing an additional 30,035 shares during the period. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP grew its position in AC Immune by 82.8% during the 1st quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP now owns 390,165 shares of the company’s stock worth $1,071,000 after purchasing an additional 176,701 shares during the period. EFG International AG purchased a new position in shares of AC Immune during the 4th quarter valued at about $41,000. Marshall Wace LLP acquired a new position in shares of AC Immune in the 4th quarter valued at about $586,000. Finally, Goldman Sachs Group Inc. lifted its holdings in shares of AC Immune by 46.9% in the 4th quarter. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. now owns 18,555 shares of the company’s stock valued at $58,000 after buying an additional 5,920 shares during the period. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 51.36% of the company’s stock.

AC Immune Company Profile

AC Immune AG is a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company headquartered in Lausanne, Switzerland, with a subsidiary in Boston, Massachusetts. The company specializes in the discovery and development of therapeutics and diagnostics for neurodegenerative diseases, with a primary focus on Alzheimer’s disease, Parkinson’s disease and other protein misfolding disorders. AC Immune leverages proprietary platform technologies to identify and optimize candidates that target pathological protein aggregates.

Since its founding in 2003, AC Immune has advanced multiple programs into clinical development.