GDS (NASDAQ:GDS) Trading Up 5.5% Following Strong Earnings

GDS Holdings Limited (NASDAQ:GDS - Get Free Report)'s stock price shot up 5.5% during trading on Wednesday following a better than expected earnings announcement. The stock traded as high as $30.25 and last traded at $29.11. 812,361 shares traded hands during mid-day trading, a decline of 74% from the average session volume of 3,157,913 shares. The stock had previously closed at $27.58.

The company reported $0.48 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of ($0.22) by $0.70. The company had revenue of $375.14 million during the quarter, compared to analysts' expectations of $2.72 billion. GDS had a negative net margin of 35.97% and a negative return on equity of 8.22%. The business's quarterly revenue was up 3.6% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the prior year, the company earned ($1.96) earnings per share.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

GDS has been the subject of several recent research reports. JMP Securities restated a "market outperform" rating and set a $40.00 target price on shares of GDS in a report on Wednesday, May 21st. Daiwa Capital Markets upgraded shares of GDS from a "neutral" rating to a "buy" rating in a report on Tuesday, February 11th. Wall Street Zen upgraded shares of GDS from a "sell" rating to a "hold" rating in a report on Wednesday, May 21st. Citigroup restated an "outperform" rating on shares of GDS in a report on Thursday, March 20th. Finally, Royal Bank of Canada cut shares of GDS from an "outperform" rating to a "sector perform" rating and increased their target price for the stock from $26.00 to $37.00 in a report on Tuesday, February 25th. Two research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, five have assigned a buy rating and three have issued a strong buy rating to the company's stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the stock presently has an average rating of "Buy" and an average price target of $39.48.

Institutional Trading of GDS

A number of large investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in GDS. American Century Companies Inc. lifted its stake in GDS by 509.6% in the fourth quarter. American Century Companies Inc. now owns 2,323,482 shares of the company's stock valued at $55,206,000 after acquiring an additional 1,942,341 shares during the last quarter. Triata Capital Ltd bought a new position in shares of GDS in the fourth quarter valued at about $41,472,000. Driehaus Capital Management LLC raised its position in shares of GDS by 195.6% in the fourth quarter. Driehaus Capital Management LLC now owns 1,845,623 shares of the company's stock valued at $43,852,000 after purchasing an additional 1,221,289 shares during the period. Aspex Management HK Ltd raised its position in shares of GDS by 23.0% in the fourth quarter. Aspex Management HK Ltd now owns 4,926,727 shares of the company's stock valued at $117,059,000 after purchasing an additional 922,709 shares during the period. Finally, Light Street Capital Management LLC bought a new position in shares of GDS in the fourth quarter valued at about $18,655,000. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 33.71% of the company's stock.

GDS Price Performance

The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 2.25, a current ratio of 1.19 and a quick ratio of 1.19. The company has a market capitalization of $5.43 billion, a P/E ratio of -9.34 and a beta of 0.28. The company's 50-day moving average price is $24.71 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $25.92.

About GDS

GDS Holdings Limited, together with its subsidiaries, develops and operates data centers in the People's Republic of China. The company provides colocation services comprising critical facilities space, customer-available power, racks, and cooling; managed hosting services, including business continuity and disaster recovery, network management, data storage, system security, operating system, database, and server middleware services; managed cloud services; and consulting services.