Short Interest in Adecoagro S.A. (NYSE:AGRO) Declines By 17.4%

Key Points

• Short interest fell 17.4% to 1,060,326 shares as of March 31, representing about 1.1% of the stock and a short-interest ratio of 0.3 days.
• CEO Mariano Bosch sold 100,000 shares on March 19 at an average price of $14.50 (≈$1.45M), cutting his ownership by 10.03%; insiders now hold 6.7% of the company.
• Analysts are mixed but leaning neutral — UBS upgraded to a Buy while others raised or trimmed ratings, and the MarketBeat consensus is a 'Hold' with an average price target of $11.53.

Adecoagro S.A. (NYSE:AGRO - Get Free Report) saw a significant decline in short interest in March. As of March 31st, there was short interest totaling 1,060,326 shares, a decline of 17.4% from the March 15th total of 1,283,659 shares. Approximately 1.1% of the company's stock are sold short. Based on an average trading volume of 3,097,126 shares, the short-interest ratio is currently 0.3 days.

Adecoagro Stock Performance

AGRO traded down $0.01 during midday trading on Thursday, reaching $13.30. The company had a trading volume of 1,030,015 shares, compared to its average volume of 1,999,706. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.77, a quick ratio of 0.82 and a current ratio of 1.38. The stock has a market cap of $1.33 billion, a PE ratio of -166.22, a P/E/G ratio of 0.27 and a beta of 0.08. Adecoagro has a 12-month low of $6.89 and a 12-month high of $15.89. The business has a 50-day moving average price of $11.60 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $9.27.

Adecoagro (NYSE:AGRO - Get Free Report) last released its earnings results on Saturday, February 14th. The company reported ($0.15) earnings per share for the quarter. Adecoagro had a negative net margin of 0.55% and a negative return on equity of 1.17%. The company had revenue of $432.91 million during the quarter. On average, sell-side analysts expect that Adecoagro will post 1.24 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Insider Activity at Adecoagro

In other news, CEO Mariano Bosch sold 100,000 shares of the business's stock in a transaction dated Thursday, March 19th. The shares were sold at an average price of $14.50, for a total transaction of $1,450,000.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer directly owned 897,249 shares of the company's stock, valued at $13,010,110.50. The trade was a 10.03% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available at this link. 6.70% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.

Institutional Trading of Adecoagro

A number of hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently bought and sold shares of the company. Sparta 24 Ltd. increased its holdings in Adecoagro by 4.8% during the 3rd quarter. Sparta 24 Ltd. now owns 2,200,278 shares of the company's stock worth $17,250,000 after acquiring an additional 100,000 shares during the period. Invesco Ltd. increased its holdings in Adecoagro by 86.5% during the 2nd quarter. Invesco Ltd. now owns 458,693 shares of the company's stock worth $4,192,000 after acquiring an additional 212,685 shares during the period. Ghisallo Capital Management LLC bought a new stake in Adecoagro during the 4th quarter worth approximately $2,987,000. Ameriprise Financial Inc. increased its holdings in Adecoagro by 32.3% during the 2nd quarter. Ameriprise Financial Inc. now owns 370,391 shares of the company's stock worth $3,385,000 after acquiring an additional 90,518 shares during the period. Finally, HRT Financial LP increased its holdings in Adecoagro by 13.4% during the 4th quarter. HRT Financial LP now owns 312,828 shares of the company's stock worth $2,480,000 after acquiring an additional 36,857 shares during the period. Institutional investors own 45.25% of the company's stock.

Analyst Ratings Changes

AGRO has been the topic of several analyst reports. Morgan Stanley upgraded shares of Adecoagro from an "underweight" rating to an "equal weight" rating and boosted their price target for the stock from $9.50 to $13.00 in a report on Tuesday, March 17th. Weiss Ratings upgraded shares of Adecoagro from a "sell (d+)" rating to a "hold (c-)" rating in a report on Wednesday, March 4th. Wall Street Zen upgraded shares of Adecoagro from a "sell" rating to a "hold" rating in a report on Saturday, April 4th. UBS Group upgraded shares of Adecoagro from a "neutral" rating to a "buy" rating and boosted their price target for the stock from $8.00 to $16.20 in a report on Monday, March 30th. Finally, Citigroup cut shares of Adecoagro from a "buy" rating to a "neutral" rating and boosted their target price for the company from $13.00 to $15.00 in a research note on Tuesday. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a Buy rating, five have issued a Hold rating and one has assigned a Sell rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, the company has a consensus rating of "Hold" and an average price target of $11.53.

About Adecoagro

Adecoagro NYSE: AGRO is a leading agricultural and renewable energy company with core operations in South America. Founded in 2002 by Argentine entrepreneur Alejandro Bulgheroni, the company has grown into a vertically integrated platform covering crop production, sugar and ethanol manufacturing, and dairy operations. Adecoagro’s business model spans the full value chain, from seed selection and planting through harvesting, processing and distribution of commodities.

The company manages over 700,000 hectares of farmland across Argentina, Brazil and Uruguay.

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