The Vanguard Group, Inc. recently announced the acquisition of new stake in Walgreens Boots Alliance Inc (NASDAQ:WBA). The institutional investor has increased its shareholding in the Healthcare company by 15.08% to 83.53 million shares with purchase of 10.95 million shares. This fresh investment now brings its stake to 9.67% valued currently at $1.67 billion. In addition, Geode Capital Management LLC raised its holdings by 0.34 million to 16.14 million shares. And Invesco Capital Management LLC has lifted its position by 22.17% or 2.76 million shares – to 15.19 million shares.
With over 22.31 million Walgreens Boots Alliance Inc (WBA) shares trading Friday and a closing price of $25.20 on the day, the dollar volume was approximately $562.29 million. The shares have shown a negative half year performance of -22.87% and its price on 12/15/23 gained nearly 0.24%. Currently, there are 863.67M common shares owned by the public and among those 712.94M shares have been available to trade.
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An analysis of what Wall Street brokers have to say about the expected price targets for this stock gives us this picture: 17 analysts who have offered their price forecasts for WBA have a consensus price objective of $25.92. The analysts have set the share’s price value over the next 12 months at a high of $37.00 and a low of $20.00. The average price target is 2.78% above its recent price level and a downside to the estimated low will see the stock lose -26.0% over that period. But an upside of 31.89% will see the stock hit the forecast high price target while median target price for the stock is $25.00.
Insiders at the company have transacted a total of 54 times over the past 12 months, according to data filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). 26 of these insider trades were purchases, accounting for 2,181,275 shares. Insider sales of the common stock occurred on 28 occasions, with total insider shares sold totaling 77,521 shares.
The top 3 mutual fund holders in Walgreens Boots Alliance Inc are Vanguard Total Stock Market ETF, Vanguard 500 Index Fund, and Vanguard Mid Cap Index Fund. Vanguard Total Stock Market ETF owns 23.0 million shares of the company’s stock, all valued at over $458.66 million. The company bought an additional 86920.0 shares recently to bring their total holdings to about 2.66% of the shares outstanding. Vanguard 500 Index Fund bought 76093.0 shares to see its total holdings expand to 17.3 million shares valued at over $344.88 million and representing 2.00% of the shares outstanding. Vanguard Mid Cap Index Fund bought 40102.0 shares to bring its total holdings to over 16.66 million shares at a value of $332.23 million. Vanguard Mid Cap Index Fund now owns shares totaling to 1.93% of the shares outstanding.
Shares of Walgreens Boots Alliance Inc (NASDAQ: WBA) opened at $25.41, up $0.27 from a prior closing price of $25.14. However, the script later moved the day high at 25.67, up 0.24%. The company’s stock has a 5-day price change of 8.81% and 13.56% over the past three months. WBA shares are trading -32.55% year to date (YTD), with the 12-month market performance down to -37.98% lower. It has a 12-month low price of $19.68 and touched a high of $40.28 over the same period. WBA has an average intraday trading volume of 12.47 million shares. The stock is trading above its simple moving averages at the SMA20, SMA50, and SMA200, as the current price level is off by 17.00%, 16.53%, and -9.78% respectively.
Institutional ownership of Walgreens Boots Alliance Inc (NASDAQ: WBA) shares accounts for 58.49% of the company’s 863.67M shares outstanding. Mutual fund holders own 34.42%, while other institutional holders and individual stakeholders account for 36.28% and 22.56% respectively.
It has a market capitalization of $21.77B and a beta (3y monthly) value of 0.72. The earnings-per-share (ttm) stands at -$3.57. Price movements for the stock have been influenced by the stock’s volatility, which stands at 5.13% over the week and 3.96% over the month.
Analysts forecast that Walgreens Boots Alliance Inc (WBA) will achieve an EPS of $0.58 for the current quarter, $0.89 for the next quarter and $3.36 for 2025. The lowest estimate earnings-per-share for the quarter is $0.51 while analysts give the company a high EPS estimate of $0.8. Comparatively, EPS for the current quarter was $1.16 a year ago. Earnings per share for the fiscal year are expected to decrease by -16.34%, and 10.51% over the next financial year.
If you are looking to buy this stock, then you may note that the average analyst recommendation by 17 brokerage firm advisors rate Walgreens Boots Alliance Inc (WBA) as a “Moderate Buy” at a consensus score of 2.76. Specifically, 3 Wall Street analysts polled rate the stock as a buy, while 11 of the 17 advise that investors “hold,” and 1 rated it as a “Sell.”
Looking at the support for the WBA, a number of firms have released research notes about the stock. JP Morgan stated their Overweight rating for the stock in a research note on October 23, 2023, with the firm’s price target at $27-$30.
