Cleveland-Cliffs (NYSE:CLF) Issues Quarterly Earnings Results

Key Points

• Cleveland-Cliffs reported a quarterly EPS of ($0.45), missing estimates by $0.01, while revenue increased by 3.6% year-over-year.
• Shares of Cleveland-Cliffs surged 21.6% on Monday, closing at $16.20 with a market cap of $8.01 billion.
• Institutional investors significantly increased their holdings, with State Street Corp raising its stake by 20.2% in the second quarter.

Cleveland-Cliffs (NYSE:CLF - Get Free Report) posted its earnings results on Monday. The mining company reported ($0.45) earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of ($0.48) by $0.03, Briefing.com reports. Cleveland-Cliffs had a negative return on equity of 17.97% and a negative net margin of 9.03%.The company had revenue of $4.73 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $4.90 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm earned ($0.33) earnings per share. The firm's quarterly revenue was up 3.6% compared to the same quarter last year.

Cleveland-Cliffs Price Performance

Shares of CLF stock traded up $2.88 during mid-day trading on Monday, reaching $16.20. The stock had a trading volume of 76,305,409 shares, compared to its average volume of 25,762,719. The company has a current ratio of 2.04, a quick ratio of 0.61 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.28. The company has a market cap of $8.01 billion, a P/E ratio of -4.75 and a beta of 1.96. Cleveland-Cliffs has a 12-month low of $5.63 and a 12-month high of $16.70. The business has a 50-day simple moving average of $11.65 and a 200 day simple moving average of $9.36.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

CLF has been the subject of several research reports. Citigroup lifted their price objective on shares of Cleveland-Cliffs from $7.50 to $11.00 and gave the company a "neutral" rating in a research note on Monday, July 21st. KeyCorp raised Cleveland-Cliffs from a "sector weight" rating to an "overweight" rating and set a $14.00 price objective for the company in a research note on Tuesday, July 22nd. Weiss Ratings restated a "sell (d)" rating on shares of Cleveland-Cliffs in a report on Wednesday, October 8th. The Goldman Sachs Group raised their price objective on Cleveland-Cliffs from $12.85 to $14.50 and gave the stock a "buy" rating in a research report on Thursday, October 9th. Finally, Morgan Stanley raised their target price on Cleveland-Cliffs from $8.00 to $10.50 and gave the company an "equal weight" rating in a report on Tuesday, July 22nd. Three analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating, five have assigned a Hold rating and two have issued a Sell rating to the company's stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the stock presently has an average rating of "Hold" and a consensus target price of $11.93.

Institutional Trading of Cleveland-Cliffs

A number of hedge funds have recently added to or reduced their stakes in CLF. PDT Partners LLC acquired a new position in shares of Cleveland-Cliffs in the 2nd quarter valued at about $715,000. Boothbay Fund Management LLC acquired a new position in shares of Cleveland-Cliffs in the 2nd quarter valued at about $469,000. Quantinno Capital Management LP lifted its stake in shares of Cleveland-Cliffs by 49.1% in the 2nd quarter. Quantinno Capital Management LP now owns 56,391 shares of the mining company's stock valued at $429,000 after purchasing an additional 18,568 shares in the last quarter. Prudential Financial Inc. lifted its stake in shares of Cleveland-Cliffs by 27.4% in the 2nd quarter. Prudential Financial Inc. now owns 49,955 shares of the mining company's stock valued at $380,000 after purchasing an additional 10,733 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Focus Partners Wealth acquired a new position in shares of Cleveland-Cliffs in the 1st quarter valued at about $339,000. 67.68% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Cleveland-Cliffs Company Profile

Cleveland-Cliffs is the largest flat-rolled steel company and the largest iron ore pellet producer in North America. The company is vertically integrated from mining through iron making, steelmaking, rolling, finishing and downstream with hot and cold stamping of steel parts and components. The company was formerly known as Cliffs Natural Resources Inc and changed its name to Cleveland-Cliffs Inc in August 2017.