UiPath (NYSE:PATH) Shares Down 3.2% - Here's Why

Key Points

• UiPath shares fell 3.2% to $14.32 on Friday, trading as low as $14.31 with about 35.7 million shares changing hands—roughly 22% above the average session volume.
• Analysts are largely cautious: the consensus rating is Hold (14 holds) with an average price target of $16.00, though a few firms have raised targets (e.g., Morgan Stanley to $19).
• Insider selling has been material recently — the CFO sold 67,468 shares and the CEO sold 45,000, with insiders offloading 1,235,048 shares (~$20.5M) over the past 90 days while still owning 23.19% of the stock.

UiPath, Inc. (NYSE:PATH - Get Free Report) traded down 3.2% during trading on Friday . The company traded as low as $14.31 and last traded at $14.32. 35,692,147 shares were traded during mid-day trading, an increase of 22% from the average session volume of 29,290,596 shares. The stock had previously closed at $14.79.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of research firms have issued reports on PATH. Cowen restated a "hold" rating on shares of UiPath in a research note on Thursday, December 4th. Morgan Stanley raised their target price on shares of UiPath from $15.00 to $19.00 and gave the stock an "equal weight" rating in a report on Tuesday, December 9th. Weiss Ratings reaffirmed a "hold (c)" rating on shares of UiPath in a report on Monday, December 29th. Wall Street Zen downgraded UiPath from a "strong-buy" rating to a "buy" rating in a research report on Saturday, December 6th. Finally, Wells Fargo & Company boosted their price objective on UiPath from $12.00 to $14.00 and gave the company an "equal weight" rating in a report on Thursday, December 4th. One research analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, one has given a Buy rating, fourteen have assigned a Hold rating and one has given a Sell rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has an average rating of "Hold" and an average target price of $16.00.

UiPath Stock Performance

The firm has a market capitalization of $7.66 billion, a PE ratio of 34.10, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 4.51 and a beta of 1.08. The firm's 50 day moving average price is $15.73 and its 200-day moving average price is $13.89.

UiPath (NYSE:PATH - Get Free Report) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, December 3rd. The company reported $0.16 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.14 by $0.02. The firm had revenue of $411.11 million during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $392.46 million. UiPath had a return on equity of 3.73% and a net margin of 14.79%.UiPath's revenue for the quarter was up 15.9% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the previous year, the business earned $0.11 EPS. On average, equities research analysts expect that UiPath, Inc. will post -0.17 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In related news, CFO Ashim Gupta sold 67,468 shares of the company's stock in a transaction dated Monday, January 5th. The shares were sold at an average price of $16.10, for a total transaction of $1,086,234.80. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief financial officer owned 557,028 shares in the company, valued at $8,968,150.80. This represents a 10.80% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at the SEC website. Also, CEO Daniel Dines sold 45,000 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, December 8th. The shares were sold at an average price of $19.21, for a total value of $864,450.00. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer directly owned 29,153,585 shares of the company's stock, valued at $560,040,367.85. The trade was a 0.15% decrease in their position. The SEC filing for this sale provides additional information. Insiders have sold 1,235,048 shares of company stock valued at $20,467,544 over the last 90 days. 23.19% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On UiPath

A number of large investors have recently modified their holdings of PATH. Noble Wealth Management PBC acquired a new position in UiPath during the fourth quarter worth about $25,000. Twin Peaks Wealth Advisors LLC purchased a new position in UiPath in the 2nd quarter worth approximately $28,000. AdvisorNet Financial Inc boosted its holdings in shares of UiPath by 320.4% during the 2nd quarter. AdvisorNet Financial Inc now owns 2,476 shares of the company's stock worth $32,000 after purchasing an additional 1,887 shares during the last quarter. GAMMA Investing LLC boosted its holdings in shares of UiPath by 48.0% during the 2nd quarter. GAMMA Investing LLC now owns 2,989 shares of the company's stock worth $38,000 after purchasing an additional 969 shares during the last quarter. Finally, IFP Advisors Inc grew its position in shares of UiPath by 508.0% in the second quarter. IFP Advisors Inc now owns 3,283 shares of the company's stock valued at $42,000 after purchasing an additional 2,743 shares in the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 62.50% of the company's stock.

UiPath Company Profile

UiPath Inc provides an end-to-end automation platform that offers a range of robotic process automation (RPA) solutions primarily in the United States, Romania, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, and internationally. The company offers a suite of interrelated software to build, manage, run, engage, measure, and govern automation within the organization. Its platform's embedded AI, ML, and NLP capabilities improve decisioning and information processing; emulate human behavior allows organizations to address a myriad of use cases; emulate human behavior allows organizations to address a myriad of use cases; multi-tenant platform enterprise deployment with security and governance and Automation Cloud, which enables customers to begin automating without the need to provision infrastructure, install applications, or perform additional configurations; intuitive interface and low-code, drag-and-drop functionality; signed to enable people and automations to work together; and tracks, measures, and forecasts the performance of automations, enables customers to gain powerful insights and generate key performance indicators with actionable metric.

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