Jefferies Financial Group Upgrades FirstCash (NASDAQ:FCFS) to "Strong-Buy"

Key Points

• Jefferies Financial Group has upgraded FirstCash (NASDAQ: FCFS) to a "strong-buy" rating, signaling confidence in the company's financial outlook.
• FirstCash reported earnings of $1.79 per share, exceeding expectations, and maintained a solid market cap of $6.13 billion.
• Institutional investors currently own approximately 80.30% of FirstCash's shares, demonstrating strong institutional interest in the company.

FirstCash (NASDAQ:FCFS - Get Free Report) was upgraded by analysts at Jefferies Financial Group to a "strong-buy" rating in a report issued on Monday,Zacks.com reports.

A number of other equities analysts also recently weighed in on the stock. Cowen reaffirmed a "buy" rating on shares of FirstCash in a research note on Monday. Capital One Financial set a $160.00 target price on shares of FirstCash in a research note on Tuesday, August 5th. Finally, Wall Street Zen downgraded shares of FirstCash from a "strong-buy" rating to a "buy" rating in a research note on Saturday, July 12th. One analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating and three have assigned a Buy rating to the company's stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock has an average rating of "Buy" and an average price target of $142.33.

FirstCash Price Performance

Shares of FirstCash stock opened at $138.11 on Monday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.79, a quick ratio of 3.12 and a current ratio of 4.21. The firm's 50-day simple moving average is $132.66 and its 200-day simple moving average is $125.48. FirstCash has a twelve month low of $100.24 and a twelve month high of $141.56. The firm has a market cap of $6.13 billion, a P/E ratio of 21.22 and a beta of 0.68.

FirstCash (NASDAQ:FCFS - Get Free Report) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, July 24th. The company reported $1.79 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.66 by $0.13. FirstCash had a net margin of 8.61% and a return on equity of 16.63%. The firm had revenue of $830.62 million during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $820.42 million. During the same period last year, the firm posted $1.37 EPS. The firm's quarterly revenue was up .0% on a year-over-year basis. As a group, research analysts expect that FirstCash will post 7.7 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Insider Buying and Selling at FirstCash

In related news, Director James H. Graves sold 6,000 shares of the stock in a transaction on Monday, August 4th. The shares were sold at an average price of $134.56, for a total transaction of $807,360.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the director owned 15,846 shares in the company, valued at approximately $2,132,237.76. This represents a 27.46% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. Also, insider Howard F. Hambleton sold 3,900 shares of the stock in a transaction on Tuesday, June 10th. The stock was sold at an average price of $130.93, for a total transaction of $510,627.00. Following the transaction, the insider owned 32,481 shares of the company's stock, valued at $4,252,737.33. The trade was a 10.72% decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Corporate insiders own 14.77% of the company's stock.

Institutional Trading of FirstCash

A number of large investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in FCFS. Barclays PLC lifted its stake in FirstCash by 25.1% in the fourth quarter. Barclays PLC now owns 102,357 shares of the company's stock valued at $10,605,000 after acquiring an additional 20,550 shares during the last quarter. XTX Topco Ltd acquired a new stake in FirstCash in the fourth quarter valued at $339,000. Jump Financial LLC raised its position in shares of FirstCash by 229.8% in the fourth quarter. Jump Financial LLC now owns 6,982 shares of the company's stock valued at $723,000 after purchasing an additional 4,865 shares during the period. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP increased its position in FirstCash by 0.9% during the fourth quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP now owns 1,043,531 shares of the company's stock worth $108,107,000 after acquiring an additional 9,264 shares during the period. Finally, MetLife Investment Management LLC increased its position in FirstCash by 8.0% during the fourth quarter. MetLife Investment Management LLC now owns 44,605 shares of the company's stock worth $4,621,000 after acquiring an additional 3,316 shares during the period. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 80.30% of the company's stock.

About FirstCash

FirstCash Holdings, Inc, together with its subsidiaries, operates retail pawn stores in the United States, Mexico, and rest of Latin America. The company operates in three segments: U.S. Pawn, Latin America Pawn, and Retail POS Payment Solutions segments. Its pawn stores lend money on the collateral of pledged personal property, including jewelry, electronics, tools, appliances, sporting goods, and musical instruments; and retails merchandise acquired through collateral forfeitures on forfeited pawn loans and over-the-counter purchases of merchandise directly from customers.

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