Morgan Stanley Has Lowered Expectations for BlackLine (NASDAQ:BL) Stock Price

Key Points

• Morgan Stanley cut BlackLine’s price target from $30 to $28 and maintained an “equal weight” rating, implying about 3.3% upside from the reported share price of $27.10.
• Analyst sentiment is mixed: MarketBeat’s consensus is “Hold,” with a $38.67 average price target; five analysts rate the stock Buy, five Hold, and three Sell.
• BlackLine reported quarterly EPS of $0.64, slightly above estimates, while revenue of $193.4 million missed consensus and rose 8.5% year over year.

BlackLine (NASDAQ:BL - Get Free Report) had its price target reduced by research analysts at Morgan Stanley from $30.00 to $28.00 in a report released on Monday, Benzinga reports. The brokerage currently has an "equal weight" rating on the technology company's stock. Morgan Stanley's target price suggests a potential upside of 3.32% from the stock's current price.

Several other brokerages have also issued reports on BL. Piper Sandler reduced their target price on shares of BlackLine from $35.00 to $30.00 and set a "neutral" rating on the stock in a research note on Friday. Cantor Fitzgerald reissued a "neutral" rating and set a $36.00 price target on shares of BlackLine in a research note on Wednesday, August 5th. DA Davidson downgraded shares of BlackLine from a "neutral" rating to an "underperform" rating and dropped their price target for the stock from $30.00 to $23.00 in a research note on Monday, September 28th. Scotiabank lowered shares of BlackLine to an "outperform" rating in a report on Tuesday, July 21st. Finally, Weiss Ratings reaffirmed a "sell (d+)" rating on shares of BlackLine in a research note on Monday, October 26th. Five equities research analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating, five have issued a Hold rating and three have issued a Sell rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat, the stock currently has an average rating of "Hold" and a consensus price target of $38.67.

BlackLine Price Performance

Shares of NASDAQ:BL traded up $1.21 during midday trading on Monday, reaching $27.10. The company's stock had a trading volume of 830,644 shares, compared to its average volume of 1,173,121. BlackLine has a fifty-two week low of $24.70 and a fifty-two week high of $59.57. The company has a market capitalization of $1.58 billion, a P/E ratio of 41.04, a P/E/G ratio of 1.70 and a beta of 0.67. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 2.16, a current ratio of 1.69 and a quick ratio of 1.72. The business's fifty day simple moving average is $30.35 and its 200-day simple moving average is $32.59.

BlackLine (NASDAQ:BL - Get Free Report) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, November 5th. The technology company reported $0.64 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.63 by $0.01. The business had revenue of $193.40 million for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $194.17 million. BlackLine had a net margin of 5.37% and a return on equity of 23.73%. The firm's quarterly revenue was up 8.5% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the prior year, the company earned $0.51 EPS. As a group, equities research analysts expect that BlackLine will post 0.99 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Insider Activity

In other news, CAO Michelle D. Stalick sold 780 shares of the business's stock in a transaction dated Thursday, August 27th. The stock was sold at an average price of $33.65, for a total transaction of $26,247.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief accounting officer directly owned 34,712 shares in the company, valued at approximately $1,168,058.80. The trade was a 2.20% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this hyperlink. Also, Director Therese Tucker sold 70,000 shares of the business's stock in a transaction dated Monday, August 24th. The stock was sold at an average price of $31.96, for a total value of $2,237,200.00. Following the transaction, the director owned 381,557 shares of the company's stock, valued at $12,194,561.72. The trade was a 15.50% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale is available in the SEC filing. Corporate insiders own 9.10% of the company's stock.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently bought and sold shares of the company. ICONIQ Capital LLC bought a new position in shares of BlackLine during the 2nd quarter worth approximately $58,584,000. Tejara Capital Ltd bought a new stake in shares of BlackLine in the 2nd quarter valued at about $6,715,000. Squarepoint Ops LLC acquired a new stake in shares of BlackLine in the second quarter valued at approximately $1,538,000. Bank of America Corp DE acquired a new stake in BlackLine during the 2nd quarter valued at $27,532,000. Finally, Public Employees Retirement System of Ohio bought a new position in shares of BlackLine in the second quarter valued at about $1,576,000. Institutional investors own 95.13% of the company's stock.

About BlackLine

BlackLine, Inc provides cloud-based financial operations and accounting automation software for businesses. Its platform is designed to help accounting and finance teams manage, standardize and automate processes that traditionally rely on spreadsheets, manual data entry and disconnected systems.

The company's products support financial close and consolidation, account reconciliations, transaction matching, intercompany accounting, accounts receivable automation and invoice-to-cash workflows.

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