EchoStar Corporation (NASDAQ:SATS) Given Consensus Rating of "Moderate Buy" by Analysts

Key Points

• EchoStar Corporation (NASDAQ:SATS) has a consensus rating of "Moderate Buy", with recommendations varying from sell to strong buy among eight analysts.
• Morgan Stanley and Deutsche Bank have significantly raised their price targets for EchoStar, with new targets set at $91.00 and $105.00 respectively.
• Insider selling activity is notable; CEO Hamid Akhavan sold over 233,918 shares, decreasing his ownership stake by 38.30%.

EchoStar Corporation (NASDAQ:SATS - Get Free Report) has received a consensus recommendation of "Moderate Buy" from the eight analysts that are covering the company, MarketBeat Ratings reports. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell recommendation, two have assigned a hold recommendation, three have given a buy recommendation and two have issued a strong buy recommendation on the company. The average 12-month price target among analysts that have updated their coverage on the stock in the last year is $75.20.

Several equities analysts recently issued reports on SATS shares. Morgan Stanley lifted their price target on shares of EchoStar from $59.00 to $91.00 and gave the company an "equal weight" rating in a report on Tuesday, September 9th. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft set a $105.00 target price on shares of EchoStar in a research note on Tuesday, September 9th. Cowen reaffirmed a "buy" rating on shares of EchoStar in a research note on Wednesday, August 27th. Zacks Research raised shares of EchoStar from a "hold" rating to a "strong-buy" rating in a research note on Monday, October 13th. Finally, Weiss Ratings reaffirmed a "sell (d-)" rating on shares of EchoStar in a research note on Wednesday, October 8th.

Insider Activity at EchoStar

In other news, Director Kathleen Q. Abernathy sold 16,754 shares of EchoStar stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, September 9th. The shares were sold at an average price of $82.35, for a total transaction of $1,379,691.90. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this link. Also, CEO Hamid Akhavan sold 233,918 shares of EchoStar stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, September 12th. The stock was sold at an average price of $75.35, for a total transaction of $17,625,721.30. Following the sale, the chief executive officer owned 376,805 shares of the company's stock, valued at approximately $28,392,256.75. This represents a 38.30% decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last three months, insiders sold 460,740 shares of company stock valued at $35,967,480. Insiders own 55.70% of the company's stock.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On EchoStar

Several institutional investors have recently modified their holdings of the business. Darsana Capital Partners LP grew its position in shares of EchoStar by 15.5% during the 2nd quarter. Darsana Capital Partners LP now owns 8,960,000 shares of the communications equipment provider's stock worth $248,192,000 after buying an additional 1,201,672 shares during the period. Geode Capital Management LLC grew its position in shares of EchoStar by 11.5% during the 2nd quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 3,449,193 shares of the communications equipment provider's stock worth $95,553,000 after buying an additional 355,009 shares during the period. Northern Trust Corp grew its position in shares of EchoStar by 25.3% during the 1st quarter. Northern Trust Corp now owns 1,699,986 shares of the communications equipment provider's stock worth $43,486,000 after buying an additional 343,590 shares during the period. Bank of New York Mellon Corp grew its position in shares of EchoStar by 32.8% during the 2nd quarter. Bank of New York Mellon Corp now owns 1,268,572 shares of the communications equipment provider's stock worth $35,139,000 after buying an additional 313,314 shares during the period. Finally, Invesco Ltd. grew its position in shares of EchoStar by 30.1% during the 2nd quarter. Invesco Ltd. now owns 913,292 shares of the communications equipment provider's stock worth $25,298,000 after buying an additional 211,421 shares during the period. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 33.62% of the company's stock.

EchoStar Trading Down 0.5%

Shares of SATS stock opened at $73.77 on Wednesday. EchoStar has a 12-month low of $14.90 and a 12-month high of $85.37. The company has a market capitalization of $21.23 billion, a P/E ratio of -70.26 and a beta of 0.96. The firm has a 50-day moving average price of $64.20 and a 200 day moving average price of $38.18. The company has a quick ratio of 1.15, a current ratio of 1.22 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.28.

EchoStar (NASDAQ:SATS - Get Free Report) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Friday, August 1st. The communications equipment provider reported ($1.06) earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of ($1.12) by $0.06. EchoStar had a negative net margin of 2.04% and a negative return on equity of 1.58%. The firm had revenue of $3.72 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $3.80 billion. During the same period last year, the firm posted ($0.76) EPS. The firm's quarterly revenue was down 5.8% on a year-over-year basis. Research analysts forecast that EchoStar will post -1.99 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

EchoStar Company Profile

EchoStar Corporation, together with its subsidiaries, provides networking technologies and services worldwide. The company operates in four segments: Pay-TV, Retail Wireless, 5G Network Deployment, Broadband and Satellite Services. The Pay-TV segment offers a direct broadcast and fixed satellite services; designs, develops, and distributes receiver system; and provides digital broadcast operations, including satellite uplinking/downlinking, transmission and, other services to third-party pay-TV providers; and multichannel, live-linear and on-demand streaming over-the-top internet-based domestic, international, Latino, and Freestream video programming services under the DISH and SLING brand names.

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