GSK (LON:GSK) Hits New 52-Week High – Should You Buy?

GSK plc (LON:GSK) reached a new 52-week high during mid-day trading on Tuesday . The company traded as high as GBX 2,230 and last traded at GBX 2,224.40, with a volume of 22655818 shares. The stock had previously closed at GBX 2,184.

Analyst Ratings Changes

GSK has been the subject of several analyst reports. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft upped their price objective on GSK from GBX 1,600 to GBX 1,675 and gave the company a “hold” rating in a research note on Thursday, January 15th. Shore Capital Group reaffirmed a “buy” rating and set a GBX 2,300 price target on shares of GSK in a report on Wednesday, February 4th. Citigroup lifted their price objective on shares of GSK from GBX 1,900 to GBX 2,250 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Monday, February 9th. UBS Group restated a “neutral” rating and set a GBX 1,940 price objective on shares of GSK in a research report on Friday, January 23rd. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. reaffirmed an “underweight” rating on shares of GSK in a report on Wednesday, January 7th. Three investment analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating, three have issued a Hold rating and one has assigned a Sell rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, the stock has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average price target of GBX 1,917.86.

GSK Stock Down 0.8%

The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 114.64, a quick ratio of 0.73 and a current ratio of 0.81. The company has a market capitalization of £90.74 billion, a PE ratio of 16.91, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.24 and a beta of 0.31. The firm’s 50-day simple moving average is GBX 1,906.70 and its 200 day simple moving average is GBX 1,712.78.

GSK (LON:GSK) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, February 4th. The company reported GBX 172 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter. GSK had a net margin of 8.02% and a return on equity of 18.08%. As a group, equities research analysts forecast that GSK plc will post 175.980975 earnings per share for the current year.

Insider Activity

In related news, insider Luke Miels sold 15,579 shares of GSK stock in a transaction on Friday, February 13th. The stock was sold at an average price of GBX 2,160, for a total transaction of £336,506.40. Also, insider Wendy Becker bought 441 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Friday, December 19th. The shares were purchased at an average price of GBX 1,809 per share, for a total transaction of £7,977.69. In the last three months, insiders purchased 4,597 shares of company stock worth $9,082,343. Company insiders own 0.20% of the company’s stock.

GSK Company Profile

GSK plc, together with its subsidiaries, engages in the research, development, and manufacture of vaccines, and specialty and general medicines to prevent and treat disease in the United Kingdom, the United States, and internationally. It operates through two segments, Commercial Operations and Total R&D. The company offers shingles, meningitis, respiratory syncytial virus, flu, polio, influenza, and pandemic vaccines. It also provides medicines for HIV, oncology, respiratory/immunology, and other specialty medicine products, as well as inhaled medicines for asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, and antibiotics for infections.