VNET Group (NASDAQ:VNET) Shares Gap Up - Should You Buy?

Key Points

• VNET Group shares saw a gap up, opening at $8.90 compared to the previous close of $8.53, but later traded at $8.60 with significant volume of over 2.3 million shares.
• Wall Street ratings are mixed, with one firm downgrading the stock to a "sell" while another raised its price target and maintained a "buy" rating, resulting in an average target price of $9.96.
• The company reported disappointing quarterly earnings, missing expectations with ($0.01) EPS, and set a negative outlook with a projected -0.06 EPS for the current year.

VNET Group, Inc. - Unsponsored ADR (NASDAQ:VNET - Get Free Report) shares gapped up prior to trading on Friday . The stock had previously closed at $8.53, but opened at $8.90. VNET Group shares last traded at $8.60, with a volume of 2,339,920 shares trading hands.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of research analysts have weighed in on VNET shares. Wall Street Zen cut shares of VNET Group from a "hold" rating to a "sell" rating in a report on Saturday, August 23rd. Bank of America increased their price objective on shares of VNET Group from $11.80 to $12.60 and gave the company a "buy" rating in a report on Friday, August 22nd. Two equities research analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating and five have issued a Buy rating to the company's stock. According to MarketBeat, the stock currently has a consensus rating of "Buy" and a consensus target price of $9.96.

VNET Group Price Performance

The stock's fifty day moving average price is $7.83 and its 200-day moving average price is $7.72. The firm has a market cap of $2.17 billion, a PE ratio of -100.75, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 6.02 and a beta of 0.16. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 2.40, a current ratio of 0.97 and a quick ratio of 0.97.

VNET Group (NASDAQ:VNET - Get Free Report) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, August 21st. The information technology services provider reported ($0.01) earnings per share for the quarter, missing analysts' consensus estimates of $0.02 by ($0.03). The business had revenue of $339.65 million for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $2.27 billion. VNET Group had a return on equity of 0.98% and a net margin of 0.74%. VNET Group has set its FY 2025 guidance at EPS. As a group, equities analysts expect that VNET Group, Inc. - Unsponsored ADR will post -0.06 EPS for the current fiscal year.

VNET Group announced that its board has approved a stock repurchase plan on Friday, June 27th that authorizes the company to repurchase $0.00 in shares. This repurchase authorization authorizes the information technology services provider to reacquire shares of its stock through open market purchases. Shares repurchase plans are usually an indication that the company's board believes its shares are undervalued.

Institutional Trading of VNET Group

Several large investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the stock. Infini Capital Management Ltd grew its holdings in shares of VNET Group by 39.2% in the second quarter. Infini Capital Management Ltd now owns 9,758,083 shares of the information technology services provider's stock valued at $67,331,000 after purchasing an additional 2,747,661 shares during the period. Orion Porfolio Solutions LLC purchased a new stake in shares of VNET Group in the 2nd quarter valued at approximately $140,000. Liontrust Investment Partners LLP increased its holdings in shares of VNET Group by 152.5% during the 2nd quarter. Liontrust Investment Partners LLP now owns 24,165 shares of the information technology services provider's stock worth $167,000 after buying an additional 14,593 shares during the last quarter. Nomura Holdings Inc. raised its position in shares of VNET Group by 28.1% during the 2nd quarter. Nomura Holdings Inc. now owns 40,919 shares of the information technology services provider's stock valued at $282,000 after buying an additional 8,964 shares during the period. Finally, Headlands Technologies LLC acquired a new position in VNET Group in the second quarter valued at approximately $55,000. 72.83% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

VNET Group Company Profile

VNET Group, Inc, an investment holding company, provides hosting and related services in China. It offers managed hosting services consisting of managed retail services, such as colocation services that dedicate data center space to house customers' servers and networking equipment, as well as allow customers to lease partial or entire cabinets for their servers; interconnectivity services that allow customers to connect their servers; value-added services, including hybrid IT, bare metal, firewall, server load balancing, data backup and recovery, data center management, server management, and backup server services; cloud services that allow customers to run applications over the internet using IT infrastructure; and VPN Services that extend customers' private networks by setting up connections through the public internet.