Needham & Company LLC Reaffirms Buy Rating for Autolus Therapeutics (NASDAQ:AUTL)

Key Points

• Needham & Company reaffirmed its "Buy" rating on Autolus with a $10 price target, while the analyst consensus is a Moderate Buy (average target $8.50) based on 1 Strong Buy, 5 Buy, 1 Hold and 1 Sell.
• Shares opened at $1.49 with a market cap of $396.6M; Autolus reported Q1 EPS of -$0.34 (missed estimates by $0.07) and revenue of $24.29M, and remains unprofitable with negative ROE and net margin.
• Institutional investors own about 72.8% of the stock, with large stake increases reported from firms including Mak Capital One, Schroder, Armistice and Bank of America.

Autolus Therapeutics (NASDAQ:AUTL - Get Free Report)'s stock had its "buy" rating reiterated by stock analysts at Needham & Company LLC in a report released on Thursday,Benzinga reports. They presently have a $10.00 price target on the stock.

Several other brokerages also recently weighed in on AUTL. Mizuho lowered their price target on Autolus Therapeutics from $12.00 to $10.00 and set an "outperform" rating for the company in a report on Tuesday, March 31st. Zacks Research raised Autolus Therapeutics from a "strong sell" rating to a "hold" rating in a report on Friday, March 13th. HC Wainwright assumed coverage on Autolus Therapeutics in a report on Tuesday, February 17th. They issued a "buy" rating and a $9.00 price target for the company. Truist Financial upgraded Autolus Therapeutics to a "strong-buy" rating in a research note on Wednesday, March 25th. Finally, Weiss Ratings restated a "sell (d-)" rating on shares of Autolus Therapeutics in a research note on Wednesday, January 21st. One research analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, five have given a Buy rating, one has issued a Hold rating and one has assigned a Sell rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, the company currently has an average rating of "Moderate Buy" and an average target price of $8.50.

Autolus Therapeutics Stock Performance

Shares of NASDAQ AUTL opened at $1.49 on Thursday. The company has a market cap of $396.55 million, a PE ratio of -1.38 and a beta of 2.04. The business has a 50-day simple moving average of $1.48 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $1.52. Autolus Therapeutics has a fifty-two week low of $1.11 and a fifty-two week high of $2.70.

Autolus Therapeutics (NASDAQ:AUTL - Get Free Report) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Friday, March 27th. The company reported ($0.34) earnings per share for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of ($0.27) by ($0.07). The business had revenue of $24.29 million during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $23.92 million. Autolus Therapeutics had a negative return on equity of 99.05% and a negative net margin of 381.40%. On average, sell-side analysts predict that Autolus Therapeutics will post -0.94 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Institutional Trading of Autolus Therapeutics

Several institutional investors have recently bought and sold shares of AUTL. Mak Capital One LLC grew its holdings in Autolus Therapeutics by 53.5% in the third quarter. Mak Capital One LLC now owns 26,017,616 shares of the company's stock valued at $42,409,000 after purchasing an additional 9,062,518 shares during the period. Schroder Investment Management Group grew its holdings in Autolus Therapeutics by 133.7% in the third quarter. Schroder Investment Management Group now owns 8,433,253 shares of the company's stock valued at $13,409,000 after purchasing an additional 4,824,763 shares during the period. Armistice Capital LLC grew its holdings in Autolus Therapeutics by 30.0% in the third quarter. Armistice Capital LLC now owns 15,600,000 shares of the company's stock valued at $25,428,000 after purchasing an additional 3,600,000 shares during the period. Bank of America Corp DE grew its holdings in Autolus Therapeutics by 108.1% in the third quarter. Bank of America Corp DE now owns 2,029,593 shares of the company's stock valued at $3,308,000 after purchasing an additional 1,054,458 shares during the period. Finally, TFG Asset Management GP Ltd grew its holdings in Autolus Therapeutics by 10.5% in the second quarter. TFG Asset Management GP Ltd now owns 9,500,000 shares of the company's stock valued at $21,660,000 after purchasing an additional 900,000 shares during the period. 72.83% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Autolus Therapeutics Company Profile

Autolus Therapeutics is a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company specializing in the development of next-generation, programmed T cell therapies for the treatment of cancer. The company leverages proprietary technologies to engineer autologous T cells that target and eradicate tumor cells, with the aim of improving safety, efficacy and durability over existing cell therapies. Its R&D platform integrates antigen receptor design, gene editing and manufacturing optimization to generate candidates tailored for specific hematologic malignancies and solid tumor indications.

The company's leading pipeline candidates include AUTO1, an optimized CD19-targeted CAR-T therapy for relapsed or refractory acute lymphoblastic leukemia, and AUTO3, a dual-targeted CD19/22 CAR-T program in development for diffuse large B-cell lymphoma.

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