Avantax Advisory Services Inc. Invests $281,000 in BlackBerry Limited (NYSE:BB)

Key Points

• Avantax Advisory Services Inc. purchased 74,650 shares of BlackBerry Limited, valued at approximately $281,000, indicating increased institutional interest in the company.
• Multiple analysts have raised their price targets for BlackBerry, with a current consensus rating of "Hold" and an average target price of $4.60.
• BlackBerry reported earnings of $0.02 per share for the last quarter, beating expectations, even though revenue declined by 15.5% year-over-year.

Avantax Advisory Services Inc. acquired a new position in shares of BlackBerry Limited (NYSE:BB - Free Report) in the first quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The fund acquired 74,650 shares of the company's stock, valued at approximately $281,000.

Other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Kestra Private Wealth Services LLC boosted its position in shares of BlackBerry by 214.4% in the first quarter. Kestra Private Wealth Services LLC now owns 41,350 shares of the company's stock valued at $156,000 after acquiring an additional 28,200 shares during the period. SBI Securities Co. Ltd. boosted its position in shares of BlackBerry by 19.5% in the first quarter. SBI Securities Co. Ltd. now owns 30,538 shares of the company's stock valued at $115,000 after acquiring an additional 4,976 shares during the period. Sigma Planning Corp boosted its position in shares of BlackBerry by 49.0% in the first quarter. Sigma Planning Corp now owns 24,326 shares of the company's stock valued at $92,000 after acquiring an additional 8,000 shares during the period. Ballentine Partners LLC boosted its position in shares of BlackBerry by 35.4% in the first quarter. Ballentine Partners LLC now owns 23,339 shares of the company's stock valued at $88,000 after acquiring an additional 6,099 shares during the period. Finally, OneDigital Investment Advisors LLC bought a new stake in shares of BlackBerry in the first quarter valued at about $40,000. 54.48% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several research firms recently weighed in on BB. Royal Bank Of Canada upped their price objective on shares of BlackBerry from $3.75 to $4.00 and gave the stock a "sector perform" rating in a research report on Friday, June 20th. CIBC reissued an "outperform" rating on shares of BlackBerry in a report on Tuesday, June 24th. Canaccord Genuity Group increased their target price on shares of BlackBerry from $4.25 to $4.60 and gave the stock a "hold" rating in a report on Tuesday, June 24th. Wall Street Zen cut shares of BlackBerry from a "buy" rating to a "hold" rating in a report on Saturday. Finally, Robert W. Baird increased their target price on shares of BlackBerry from $4.00 to $5.00 and gave the stock a "neutral" rating in a report on Wednesday, June 25th. Four investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and three have issued a buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock has an average rating of "Hold" and an average target price of $4.60.

BlackBerry Trading Up 1.0%

Shares of BlackBerry stock traded up $0.04 on Wednesday, hitting $3.71. The stock had a trading volume of 2,027,640 shares, compared to its average volume of 17,872,867. The stock has a 50 day moving average of $4.08 and a 200 day moving average of $4.11. BlackBerry Limited has a twelve month low of $2.22 and a twelve month high of $6.24. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.27, a quick ratio of 2.10 and a current ratio of 2.10. The firm has a market capitalization of $2.20 billion, a P/E ratio of -61.75 and a beta of 1.49.

BlackBerry (NYSE:BB - Get Free Report) last released its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, June 24th. The company reported $0.02 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of ($0.01) by $0.03. The company had revenue of $121.26 million during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $112.18 million. BlackBerry had a positive return on equity of 2.29% and a negative net margin of 6.44%. The firm's revenue was down 15.5% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the prior year, the firm posted ($0.03) earnings per share. Sell-side analysts expect that BlackBerry Limited will post -0.03 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other BlackBerry news, CEO John Joseph Giamatteo sold 26,998 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, July 2nd. The shares were sold at an average price of $4.32, for a total transaction of $116,631.36. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer owned 530,135 shares of the company's stock, valued at approximately $2,290,183.20. This represents a 4.85% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. Also, insider Philip S. Kurtz sold 16,217 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, June 24th. The shares were sold at an average price of $5.25, for a total transaction of $85,139.25. Following the sale, the insider directly owned 57,503 shares of the company's stock, valued at $301,890.75. This represents a 22.00% decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 58,417 shares of company stock valued at $267,524 in the last three months. Insiders own 0.37% of the company's stock.

BlackBerry Company Profile

BlackBerry Limited provides intelligent security software and services to enterprises and governments worldwide. The company operates through three segments: Cybersecurity, IoT, and Licensing and Other. The company offers CylanceENDPOINT, an integrated endpoint security solution; CylanceGUARD, a managed detection and response solution; CylanceEDGE, an AI-powered continuous authentication zero trust network access solution; CylanceINTELLIGENCE, a contextual cyber threat intelligence service; BlackBerry Dynamics offers a development platform and secure container for mobile applications; BlackBerry Workspaces a secure Enterprise File Sync and Share (EFSS) solution; BlackBerry Messenger (BBM) Enterprise, an enterprise-grade secure instant messaging solution for messaging, voice and video; BlackBerry SecuSUITE is a certified, multi-OS voice and text messaging solution; BlackBerry AtHoc, a secure networked critical event management solution; and BlackBerry unified endpoint management (UEM) solutions.