Elastic (NYSE:ESTC) Sees Large Increase in Short Interest

Elastic (NYSE:ESTC) was the target of a large growth in short interest in March. As of March 15th, there was short interest totalling 3,360,000 shares, a growth of 24.4% from the February 28th total of 2,700,000 shares. Approximately 3.7% of the company’s stock are short sold. Based on an average daily volume of 1,390,000 shares, the short-interest ratio is presently 2.4 days.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several brokerages have weighed in on ESTC. Guggenheim increased their price objective on Elastic from $130.00 to $136.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Friday, February 28th. Piper Sandler increased their price target on Elastic from $130.00 to $135.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Friday, February 28th. Scotiabank decreased their price objective on Elastic from $140.00 to $137.00 and set a “sector outperform” rating for the company in a report on Thursday, March 27th. UBS Group upped their price objective on shares of Elastic from $140.00 to $148.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Friday, February 28th. Finally, Canaccord Genuity Group lifted their target price on shares of Elastic from $130.00 to $135.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Friday, February 28th. Seven analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, eighteen have issued a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $130.74.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Elastic news, CTO Shay Banon sold 2,683 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Monday, March 10th. The stock was sold at an average price of $90.78, for a total value of $243,562.74. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief technology officer now owns 4,535,456 shares in the company, valued at $411,728,695.68. This represents a 0.06 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through the SEC website. Also, CEO Ashutosh Kulkarni sold 5,000 shares of Elastic stock in a transaction on Tuesday, March 25th. The stock was sold at an average price of $102.64, for a total value of $513,200.00. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 371,591 shares in the company, valued at $38,140,100.24. The trade was a 1.33 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last ninety days, insiders sold 198,304 shares of company stock valued at $20,847,452. Corporate insiders own 15.90% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Trading of Elastic

A number of institutional investors and hedge funds have recently added to or reduced their stakes in ESTC. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. raised its stake in Elastic by 2.7% in the third quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. now owns 545,870 shares of the company’s stock worth $41,901,000 after buying an additional 14,590 shares in the last quarter. The Manufacturers Life Insurance Company boosted its position in shares of Elastic by 12.0% during the third quarter. The Manufacturers Life Insurance Company now owns 16,431 shares of the company’s stock valued at $1,261,000 after purchasing an additional 1,757 shares in the last quarter. BNP Paribas Financial Markets grew its stake in Elastic by 190.2% in the third quarter. BNP Paribas Financial Markets now owns 66,786 shares of the company’s stock worth $5,126,000 after purchasing an additional 43,772 shares during the period. Zurcher Kantonalbank Zurich Cantonalbank raised its holdings in Elastic by 8.9% in the third quarter. Zurcher Kantonalbank Zurich Cantonalbank now owns 35,978 shares of the company’s stock worth $2,762,000 after purchasing an additional 2,928 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Edgestream Partners L.P. purchased a new position in Elastic during the third quarter valued at $574,000. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 97.03% of the company’s stock.

Elastic Price Performance

Shares of Elastic stock opened at $91.48 on Thursday. The company’s fifty day simple moving average is $104.65 and its two-hundred day simple moving average is $96.47. Elastic has a 12-month low of $69.00 and a 12-month high of $123.96. The firm has a market cap of $9.55 billion, a PE ratio of 166.33 and a beta of 1.20. The company has a quick ratio of 1.99, a current ratio of 1.99 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.70.

Elastic (NYSE:ESTC) last posted its earnings results on Thursday, February 27th. The company reported ($0.01) earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $0.47 by ($0.48). The business had revenue of $382.08 million during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $368.85 million. Elastic had a negative return on equity of 13.20% and a net margin of 4.39%. As a group, equities analysts expect that Elastic will post -0.77 EPS for the current year.

Elastic Company Profile

Elastic N.V., a data analytics company, delivers solutions designed to run in public or private clouds in multi-cloud environments. It primarily offers Elastic Stack, a set of software products that ingest and store data from various sources and formats, as well as performs search, analysis, and visualization on that data.