Onto Innovation (NYSE:ONTO) Shares Gap Up - Here's What Happened

Key Points

• Onto Innovation shares jumped at the open: The stock opened at $174.95, up from its prior close of $155.99, and was last trading at about $170.24. The article does not identify a specific catalyst for the move.
• Analyst sentiment was broadly positive: MarketBeat reported a consensus “Buy” rating and an average price target of $380, based on ratings that included two Strong Buys and eleven Buys.
• The company reported better-than-expected quarterly results: Earnings of $1.93 per share beat the $1.69 consensus, while revenue of $343.13 million exceeded expectations and rose 35.3% year over year.

Onto Innovation Inc. (NYSE:ONTO - Get Free Report)'s stock price gapped up before the market opened on Friday. The stock had previously closed at $155.99, but opened at $174.95. Onto Innovation shares last traded at $170.2380, with a volume of 116,463 shares trading hands.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

Several equities research analysts recently issued reports on ONTO shares. Wall Street Zen raised shares of Onto Innovation from a "hold" rating to a "buy" rating in a report on Sunday, August 9th. Evercore restated an "outperform" rating and set a $390.00 target price on shares of Onto Innovation in a research note on Friday, August 7th. The Goldman Sachs Group assumed coverage on shares of Onto Innovation in a report on Monday, August 17th. They set a "buy" rating and a $400.00 price target on the stock. Morgan Stanley dropped their price target on shares of Onto Innovation from $383.00 to $360.00 and set an "overweight" rating for the company in a research report on Tuesday, September 8th. Finally, Cantor Fitzgerald reissued an "overweight" rating on shares of Onto Innovation in a research note on Tuesday, October 20th. Two analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, eleven have given a Buy rating and one has given a Hold rating to the company's stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock currently has an average rating of "Buy" and an average target price of $380.00.

Onto Innovation Price Performance

The firm's fifty day simple moving average is $256.04 and its 200 day simple moving average is $259.51. The firm has a market cap of $8.38 billion, a P/E ratio of 64.09, a P/E/G ratio of 0.60 and a beta of 1.66. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.77, a quick ratio of 8.33 and a current ratio of 9.73.

Onto Innovation (NYSE:ONTO - Get Free Report) last released its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, August 6th. The semiconductor company reported $1.93 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.69 by $0.24. Onto Innovation had a return on equity of 13.44% and a net margin of 11.84%. The business had revenue of $343.13 million during the quarter, compared to analysts' expectations of $325.29 million. During the same quarter last year, the business posted $1.25 EPS. The firm's revenue for the quarter was up 35.3% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, analysts forecast that Onto Innovation Inc. will post 8.04 earnings per share for the current year.

Insider Buying and Selling

In related news, Director Susan Lynch sold 1,000 shares of Onto Innovation stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, August 21st. The shares were sold at an average price of $302.30, for a total transaction of $302,300.00. Following the transaction, the director directly owned 2,684 shares of the company's stock, valued at $811,373.20. This trade represents a 27.14% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available through this link. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Also, Director David Miller sold 2,000 shares of Onto Innovation stock in a transaction on Tuesday, September 29th. The shares were sold at an average price of $300.00, for a total value of $600,000.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the director owned 10,692 shares in the company, valued at $3,207,600. This represents a 15.76% decrease in their ownership of the stock. Additional details regarding this sale are available in the official SEC disclosure. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. 0.51% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

Institutional Trading of Onto Innovation

Institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in the business. Andar Capital Management HK Ltd acquired a new position in shares of Onto Innovation in the 2nd quarter valued at $69,000,000. BlackRock Inc. purchased a new position in Onto Innovation in the 2nd quarter worth $2,083,436,000. Paradigm Capital Management Inc. NY purchased a new position in Onto Innovation in the 2nd quarter worth $416,839,000. William Blair Investment Management LLC acquired a new stake in Onto Innovation during the 2nd quarter worth about $251,812,000. Finally, Bank of New York Mellon Corp purchased a new stake in Onto Innovation during the 2nd quarter valued at about $162,052,000. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 98.35% of the company's stock.

About Onto Innovation

Onto Innovation Inc NYSE: ONTO develops process control and inspection equipment used by semiconductor manufacturers and advanced packaging companies. Its products help customers monitor, measure and improve manufacturing processes throughout the production of integrated circuits, wafers and packaged semiconductor devices.

The company offers optical metrology systems, wafer and macro-defect inspection tools, advanced packaging inspection and metrology solutions, lithography systems, and process control software.

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