Applied Digital Target of Unusually High Options Trading (NASDAQ:APLD)

Applied Digital Co. (NASDAQ:APLD - Get Free Report) was the target of some unusual options trading activity on Monday. Traders purchased 148,966 call options on the stock. This is an increase of 155% compared to the average volume of 58,450 call options.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

APLD has been the topic of several research reports. JMP Securities raised their price target on shares of Applied Digital from $12.00 to $18.00 and gave the stock a "market outperform" rating in a research note on Tuesday. Citizens Jmp raised shares of Applied Digital to a "strong-buy" rating and set a $12.00 price target on the stock in a research note on Thursday, May 22nd. Northland Securities raised their price target on shares of Applied Digital from $12.00 to $20.00 and gave the stock an "outperform" rating in a research note on Tuesday, February 4th. HC Wainwright raised their price target on shares of Applied Digital from $7.00 to $12.00 and gave the stock a "buy" rating in a research note on Tuesday. Finally, Needham & Company LLC restated a "buy" rating and set a $10.00 price objective on shares of Applied Digital in a research report on Monday. Ten equities research analysts have rated the stock with a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the company's stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has an average rating of "Buy" and a consensus target price of $11.91.

Insider Buying and Selling at Applied Digital

In other news, Director Rachel H. Lee sold 24,212 shares of the firm's stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, May 21st. The shares were sold at an average price of $7.00, for a total value of $169,484.00. Following the transaction, the director now directly owns 83,613 shares of the company's stock, valued at approximately $585,291. This trade represents a 22.45% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available at this link. Insiders own 11.81% of the company's stock.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Applied Digital

A number of institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in APLD. Situational Awareness LP acquired a new stake in shares of Applied Digital during the first quarter valued at about $22,680,000. Vanguard Group Inc. increased its position in shares of Applied Digital by 39.1% during the fourth quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 12,760,035 shares of the company's stock valued at $97,487,000 after acquiring an additional 3,587,619 shares during the last quarter. Van ECK Associates Corp increased its position in shares of Applied Digital by 113.8% during the fourth quarter. Van ECK Associates Corp now owns 4,404,313 shares of the company's stock valued at $33,649,000 after acquiring an additional 2,344,572 shares during the last quarter. Tidal Investments LLC increased its position in shares of Applied Digital by 14,635.7% during the fourth quarter. Tidal Investments LLC now owns 1,697,850 shares of the company's stock valued at $12,972,000 after acquiring an additional 1,686,328 shares during the last quarter. Finally, American Century Companies Inc. acquired a new stake in shares of Applied Digital during the fourth quarter valued at about $12,843,000. 65.67% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Applied Digital Trading Up 1.1%

Applied Digital stock traded up $0.11 during midday trading on Tuesday, hitting $10.25. 150,246,092 shares of the stock were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 33,631,281. Applied Digital has a fifty-two week low of $3.01 and a fifty-two week high of $12.48. The stock has a market capitalization of $2.30 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of -5.92 and a beta of 6.09. The stock's 50-day simple moving average is $5.61 and its 200 day simple moving average is $7.42. The company has a current ratio of 0.77, a quick ratio of 0.77 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.22.

Applied Digital (NASDAQ:APLD - Get Free Report) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Monday, April 14th. The company reported ($0.16) earnings per share for the quarter, missing analysts' consensus estimates of ($0.11) by ($0.05). Applied Digital had a negative net margin of 127.86% and a negative return on equity of 117.67%. The company had revenue of $52.92 million for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $62.91 million. During the same quarter in the prior year, the business earned ($0.24) earnings per share. On average, equities analysts anticipate that Applied Digital will post -0.96 EPS for the current year.

About Applied Digital

Applied Digital Corporation designs, develops, and operates datacenters in North America. Its datacenters provide digital infrastructure solutions to the high-performance computing industry. The company also provides artificial intelligence cloud services, high performance computing datacenter hosting, and crypto datacenter hosting services.