POET Technologies (NASDAQ:POET) Shares Gap Up - Time to Buy?

Key Points

• POET shares gapped up before the open, jumping about 20% from a $10.25 close to an $11.53 open and last trading near $11.81 on heavy volume (~35.16 million shares).
• Despite the rally, analysts hold a consensus "Sell" rating with an average target of $8 following recent downgrades, and the company missed quarterly estimates (EPS -$0.09 vs. -$0.06 expected; revenue $0.34M vs. $0.40M) with deeply negative profitability metrics.
• POET, a Canadian fabless silicon photonics firm with a ~$1.62 billion market cap, has seen recent institutional buys from firms like Desjardins and Raymond James, though hedge funds own only about 1.99% of the stock.

POET Technologies Inc. (NASDAQ:POET - Get Free Report)'s share price gapped up before the market opened on Wednesday . The stock had previously closed at $10.25, but opened at $11.53. POET Technologies shares last traded at $11.8050, with a volume of 35,164,188 shares changing hands.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several equities analysts have commented on the company. Wall Street Zen lowered POET Technologies from a "hold" rating to a "sell" rating in a research report on Saturday, April 4th. Weiss Ratings restated a "sell (d-)" rating on shares of POET Technologies in a report on Thursday, January 22nd. One analyst has rated the stock with a Sell rating, According to MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has a consensus rating of "Sell" and an average target price of $8.00.

POET Technologies Stock Up 20.0%

The firm has a market cap of $1.62 billion, a PE ratio of -21.90 and a beta of 0.36. The stock's fifty day simple moving average is $6.39 and its two-hundred day simple moving average is $6.47.

POET Technologies (NASDAQ:POET - Get Free Report) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, March 31st. The company reported ($0.09) earnings per share for the quarter, missing analysts' consensus estimates of ($0.06) by ($0.03). The business had revenue of $0.34 million during the quarter, compared to analysts' expectations of $0.40 million. POET Technologies had a negative return on equity of 38.88% and a negative net margin of 5,857.02%. On average, equities research analysts anticipate that POET Technologies Inc. will post -0.21 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On POET Technologies

A number of institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in the company. Federation des caisses Desjardins du Quebec grew its holdings in shares of POET Technologies by 33.6% during the fourth quarter. Federation des caisses Desjardins du Quebec now owns 618,604 shares of the company's stock valued at $3,910,000 after buying an additional 155,428 shares during the last quarter. Private Advisor Group LLC purchased a new stake in shares of POET Technologies during the fourth quarter valued at approximately $2,707,000. Raymond James Financial Inc. grew its holdings in shares of POET Technologies by 75.1% during the third quarter. Raymond James Financial Inc. now owns 413,333 shares of the company's stock valued at $2,290,000 after buying an additional 177,341 shares during the last quarter. Royal Bank of Canada grew its holdings in shares of POET Technologies by 55.1% during the fourth quarter. Royal Bank of Canada now owns 124,468 shares of the company's stock valued at $788,000 after buying an additional 44,205 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Jump Financial LLC purchased a new stake in shares of POET Technologies during the second quarter valued at approximately $619,000. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 1.99% of the company's stock.

About POET Technologies

POET Technologies Inc is a Canadian fabless semiconductor company focused on the development and commercialization of integrated silicon photonics platforms. Leveraging proprietary POET Optical Interposer™ technology, the company designs and manufactures optical input/output (I/O) solutions that enable high-bandwidth, low-power data transmission between electronic chips and fiber-optic networks. By integrating optical waveguides, lasers, detectors and electronic drivers onto a single chip, POET aims to address the growing demand for faster, more energy-efficient data connectivity in telecommunications, data centers and high-performance computing applications.

The company’s core products include silicon photonics interposer arrays, active optical cables and optical transceiver modules.

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