Insider Selling: Vaxcyte (NASDAQ:PCVX) CAO Sells 3,000 Shares of Stock

Key Points

• Vaxcyte CAO Elvia Cowan sold 3,000 shares on April 7 at an average of $60 under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 plan, cutting her stake by 9.38% to 28,975 shares (about $1.74M).
• Cowan also sold 2,500 shares on March 11 and 1,892 shares on March 17, bringing recent insider sales to 7,392 shares for roughly $431,600 in total.
• PCVX trades around $60 with a market cap of $8.65B and reported an EPS miss, but analysts maintain a Moderate Buy consensus and a $86 average price target.

Vaxcyte, Inc. (NASDAQ:PCVX - Get Free Report) CAO Elvia Cowan sold 3,000 shares of Vaxcyte stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, April 7th. The stock was sold at an average price of $60.00, for a total value of $180,000.00. Following the transaction, the chief accounting officer owned 28,975 shares in the company, valued at approximately $1,738,500. This represents a 9.38% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available at the SEC website. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan.

Elvia Cowan also recently made the following trade(s):

• On Tuesday, March 17th, Elvia Cowan sold 1,892 shares of Vaxcyte stock. The stock was sold at an average price of $55.57, for a total value of $105,138.44.
• On Wednesday, March 11th, Elvia Cowan sold 2,500 shares of Vaxcyte stock. The stock was sold at an average price of $58.59, for a total value of $146,475.00.

Vaxcyte Stock Performance

PCVX stock traded down $0.59 during midday trading on Wednesday, hitting $60.10. 1,511,453 shares of the company's stock were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 1,404,675. The stock's fifty day moving average price is $56.79 and its 200-day moving average price is $48.94. The company has a market cap of $8.65 billion, a PE ratio of -10.69 and a beta of 1.38. Vaxcyte, Inc. has a one year low of $27.66 and a one year high of $65.00.

Vaxcyte (NASDAQ:PCVX - Get Free Report) last posted its earnings results on Tuesday, February 24th. The company reported ($1.80) earnings per share for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of ($1.46) by ($0.34). During the same period in the previous year, the company posted ($1.12) earnings per share. On average, analysts expect that Vaxcyte, Inc. will post -4.21 EPS for the current year.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of brokerages have recently commented on PCVX. Guggenheim restated a "buy" rating and issued a $116.00 price target on shares of Vaxcyte in a report on Monday, February 2nd. Jefferies Financial Group restated a "buy" rating on shares of Vaxcyte in a report on Tuesday, March 10th. Needham & Company LLC boosted their price target on Vaxcyte from $90.00 to $110.00 and gave the company a "buy" rating in a report on Wednesday, January 7th. Weiss Ratings restated a "sell (d-)" rating on shares of Vaxcyte in a report on Friday, January 9th. Finally, BTIG Research boosted their price target on Vaxcyte from $85.00 to $89.00 and gave the company a "buy" rating in a report on Wednesday, February 25th. Seven investment analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating, one has issued a Hold rating and one has given a Sell rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat, Vaxcyte presently has an average rating of "Moderate Buy" and a consensus price target of $86.00.

Institutional Trading of Vaxcyte

A number of hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently modified their holdings of the stock. EverSource Wealth Advisors LLC increased its position in shares of Vaxcyte by 33.0% in the fourth quarter. EverSource Wealth Advisors LLC now owns 741 shares of the company's stock valued at $34,000 after acquiring an additional 184 shares during the last quarter. CWM LLC increased its position in shares of Vaxcyte by 9.0% in the fourth quarter. CWM LLC now owns 2,840 shares of the company's stock valued at $131,000 after acquiring an additional 234 shares during the last quarter. Harbor Capital Advisors Inc. increased its position in shares of Vaxcyte by 0.8% in the fourth quarter. Harbor Capital Advisors Inc. now owns 31,274 shares of the company's stock valued at $1,443,000 after acquiring an additional 252 shares during the last quarter. HighVista Strategies LLC increased its position in shares of Vaxcyte by 1.1% in the second quarter. HighVista Strategies LLC now owns 33,457 shares of the company's stock valued at $1,088,000 after acquiring an additional 355 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Smartleaf Asset Management LLC increased its position in shares of Vaxcyte by 156.2% in the fourth quarter. Smartleaf Asset Management LLC now owns 597 shares of the company's stock valued at $27,000 after acquiring an additional 364 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 96.78% of the company's stock.

About Vaxcyte

Vaxcyte, Inc NASDAQ: PCVX is a clinical-stage biotechnology company focused on developing a new generation of preventive vaccines aimed at combating serious bacterial diseases. Headquartered in San Carlos, California, Vaxcyte leverages proprietary conjugation technologies to design and manufacture multivalent vaccines targeting pathogens for which there remain significant unmet medical needs. The company's platform is intended to streamline the production of conjugate vaccines by improving antigen presentation and broadening strain coverage compared with conventional approaches.

Vaxcyte's lead candidate, VAX-24, is a 24-valent pneumococcal conjugate vaccine designed to protect against 24 serotypes of Streptococcus pneumoniae.

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