Victory Capital Management Inc. Decreases Position in BJ's Restaurants, Inc. (NASDAQ:BJRI)

Victory Capital Management Inc. cut its position in BJ's Restaurants, Inc. (NASDAQ:BJRI - Free Report) by 26.4% in the 1st quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the SEC. The fund owned 53,952 shares of the restaurant operator's stock after selling 19,386 shares during the period. Victory Capital Management Inc. owned approximately 0.24% of BJ's Restaurants worth $1,848,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Other institutional investors and hedge funds also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. DekaBank Deutsche Girozentrale purchased a new position in BJ's Restaurants in the first quarter worth $97,000. Headlands Technologies LLC acquired a new stake in BJ's Restaurants in the 4th quarter valued at about $108,000. Two Sigma Securities LLC purchased a new position in shares of BJ's Restaurants during the fourth quarter worth about $201,000. ProShare Advisors LLC purchased a new position in BJ's Restaurants in the 4th quarter valued at $203,000. Finally, Dark Forest Capital Management LP purchased a new stake in BJ's Restaurants during the fourth quarter worth about $250,000. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 99.95% of the company's stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of research firms have recently commented on BJRI. Barclays boosted their target price on shares of BJ's Restaurants from $33.00 to $37.00 and gave the stock an "underweight" rating in a research report on Thursday, July 17th. Wall Street Zen upgraded BJ's Restaurants from a "hold" rating to a "buy" rating in a report on Saturday, July 5th. Finally, Sanford C. Bernstein set a $33.00 price target on shares of BJ's Restaurants and gave the company an "underweight" rating in a report on Friday, May 2nd. Two equities research analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, three have given a hold rating and two have issued a buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company has a consensus rating of "Hold" and an average target price of $38.00.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, insider Brian S. Krakower sold 3,738 shares of the company's stock in a transaction on Thursday, May 15th. The stock was sold at an average price of $44.32, for a total value of $165,668.16. Following the completion of the sale, the insider directly owned 4,579 shares in the company, valued at $202,941.28. This represents a 44.94% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available at this link. Also, Director Greg Trojan sold 146,102 shares of the company's stock in a transaction dated Friday, May 16th. The stock was sold at an average price of $44.63, for a total transaction of $6,520,532.26. Following the completion of the transaction, the director owned 19,896 shares in the company, valued at $887,958.48. This represents a 88.01% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. 4.30% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

BJ's Restaurants Trading Up 1.1%

BJRI traded up $0.40 during trading on Wednesday, hitting $36.72. The company's stock had a trading volume of 826,801 shares, compared to its average volume of 472,616. The firm's 50 day moving average price is $43.16 and its 200-day moving average price is $38.12. BJ's Restaurants, Inc. has a twelve month low of $27.61 and a twelve month high of $47.02. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.23, a current ratio of 0.39 and a quick ratio of 0.31. The stock has a market cap of $812.25 million, a PE ratio of 39.06, a PEG ratio of 1.36 and a beta of 1.56.

BJ's Restaurants (NASDAQ:BJRI - Get Free Report) last released its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, May 1st. The restaurant operator reported $0.59 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts' consensus estimates of $0.39 by $0.20. The company had revenue of $347.97 million during the quarter, compared to analysts' expectations of $347.70 million. BJ's Restaurants had a net margin of 1.64% and a return on equity of 10.35%. The business's quarterly revenue was up 3.2% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the prior year, the company earned $0.32 earnings per share. On average, analysts expect that BJ's Restaurants, Inc. will post 1.5 earnings per share for the current year.

BJ's Restaurants Profile

BJ's Restaurants, Inc owns and operates casual dining restaurants in the United States. Its restaurants offer pizzas, craft and other beers, appetizers, entrées, pastas, sandwiches, specialty salads, and desserts under brand name Pizookie. The company was formerly known as Chicago Pizza & Brewery, Inc and changed its name to BJ's Restaurants, Inc in August 2004.