Valneva (NASDAQ:VALN) Shares Gap Up - What's Next?

Valneva SE (NASDAQ:VALN - Get Free Report) shares gapped up before the market opened on Tuesday . The stock had previously closed at $6.63, but opened at $7.05. Valneva shares last traded at $6.89, with a volume of 1,702 shares changing hands.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several research analysts recently weighed in on VALN shares. HC Wainwright restated a "buy" rating and set a $17.00 target price on shares of Valneva in a research note on Tuesday, April 15th. Guggenheim dropped their price target on Valneva from $17.00 to $15.00 and set a "buy" rating on the stock in a research note on Monday, March 24th.

Valneva Trading Up 0.6 %

The firm has a market cap of $588.38 million, a PE ratio of -54.12 and a beta of 1.85. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.70, a current ratio of 2.78 and a quick ratio of 2.25. The stock's fifty day simple moving average is $6.92 and its 200-day simple moving average is $5.69.

Valneva (NASDAQ:VALN - Get Free Report) last issued its earnings results on Thursday, March 20th. The company reported ($0.54) earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, missing analysts' consensus estimates of ($0.22) by ($0.32). The firm had revenue of $56.48 million during the quarter, compared to analysts' expectations of $55.64 million. Valneva had a negative return on equity of 3.93% and a negative net margin of 4.35%. On average, sell-side analysts forecast that Valneva SE will post 0.13 earnings per share for the current year.

Institutional Trading of Valneva

Several large investors have recently made changes to their positions in the business. ABC Arbitrage SA acquired a new position in Valneva during the fourth quarter valued at $84,000. GAMMA Investing LLC purchased a new position in shares of Valneva during the 1st quarter valued at about $94,000. Finally, Wells Fargo & Company MN lifted its holdings in shares of Valneva by 14.3% in the 4th quarter. Wells Fargo & Company MN now owns 246,766 shares of the company's stock valued at $1,079,000 after buying an additional 30,859 shares during the period. 11.39% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Valneva Company Profile

Valneva SE, a specialty vaccine company, develops, manufactures, and commercializes prophylactic vaccines for infectious diseases with unmet needs. It offers IXIARO, an inactivated Vero cell culture-derived Japanese encephalitis vaccine indicated for active immunization against Japanese encephalitis; DUKORAL, an oral vaccine for the prevention of diarrhea caused by Vibrio cholera and/or heat-labile toxin producing enterotoxigenic Escherichia coli bacterium; IXCHIQ, a single-dose, live-attenuated vaccine for the prevention of disease caused by chikungunya virus; and VLA2001, an inactivated whole-virus COVID-19 vaccine.