Wellington Management Co. LLP recently announced the acquisition of new stake in Astrazeneca plc ADR (NASDAQ:AZN). The institutional investor has increased its shareholding in the Healthcare company by 0.73% to 49.49 million shares with purchase of 0.36 million shares. This fresh investment now brings its stake to 1.60% valued currently at $3.2 billion. In addition, T. Rowe Price Associates, Inc. raised its holdings by 0.63 million to 45.26 million shares. And Jennison Associates LLC has lifted its position by 5.22% or 1.14 million shares – to 22.95 million shares.
With over 7.31 million Astrazeneca plc ADR (AZN) shares trading Tuesday and a closing price of $68.40 on the day, the dollar volume was approximately $500.04 million. The shares have shown a positive half year performance of 4.83% and its price on 01/02/24 gained nearly 1.56%. Currently, there are 3.10B common shares owned by the public and among those 3.10B 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: 28 analysts who have offered their price forecasts for AZN have a consensus price objective of $164.70. The analysts have set the share’s price value over the next 12 months at a high of $215.03 and a low of $130.00. The average price target is 16.81% above its recent price level and an upside to the estimated low will see the stock gain 47.38% over that period. But an upside of 68.19% will see the stock hit the forecast high price target while median target price for the stock is $162.26.
The top 3 mutual fund holders in Astrazeneca plc ADR are Vanguard PRIMECAP Fund, Washington Mutual Investors Fund, and Vanguard Wellington Fund. Vanguard PRIMECAP Fund owns 25.81 million shares of the company’s stock, all valued at over $1.67 billion. The company bought an additional 0.14 million shares recently to bring their total holdings to about 0.83% of the shares outstanding. Washington Mutual Investors Fund sold -4.22 million shares to see its total holdings shrink to 22.46 million shares valued at over $1.45 billion and representing 0.73% of the shares outstanding. Vanguard Wellington Fund sold -0.25 million shares to bring its total holdings to over 16.82 million shares at a value of $1.09 billion. Vanguard Wellington Fund now owns shares totaling to 0.54% of the shares outstanding.
Shares of Astrazeneca plc ADR (NASDAQ: AZN) opened at $66.84, down -$0.51 from a prior closing price of $67.35. However, the script later moved the day high at 68.61, up 1.56%. The company’s stock has a 5-day price change of 3.18% and 2.50% over the past three months. AZN shares are trading 1.56% year to date (YTD), with the 12-month market performance up to 0.44% higher. It has a 12-month low price of $61.73 and touched a high of $76.56 over the same period. AZN has an average intraday trading volume of 5.62 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 4.63%, 6.21%, and -0.65% respectively.
Institutional ownership of Astrazeneca plc ADR (NASDAQ: AZN) shares accounts for 16.14% of the company’s 3.10B shares outstanding. Mutual fund holders own 7.07%, while other institutional holders and individual stakeholders account for 9.11% and — respectively.
It has a market capitalization of $212.03B and a beta (3y monthly) value of 0.50. The stock’s trailing 12-month PE ratio is 36.17, while the earnings-per-share (ttm) stands at $1.89. The company has a PEG of 2.85 and a Quick Ratio of 0.60 with the debt-to-equity ratio at 0.77. Price movements for the stock have been influenced by the stock’s volatility, which stands at 1.09% over the week and 1.17% over the month.
Analysts forecast that Astrazeneca plc ADR (AZN) will achieve an EPS of $0.79 for the current quarter, $1.01 for the next quarter and $4.3 for 2024. The lowest estimate earnings-per-share for the quarter is $0.69 while analysts give the company a high EPS estimate of $0.87. Comparatively, EPS for the current quarter was $0.69 a year ago. Earnings per share for the fiscal year are expected to increase by 10.29%, and 13.83% over the next financial year. EPS should grow at an annualized rate of 12.70% over the next five years, compared to -2.17% over the past 5-year period.
If you are looking to buy this stock, then you may note that the average analyst recommendation by 28 brokerage firm advisors rate Astrazeneca plc ADR (AZN) as a “Strong Buy” at a consensus score of 1.36. Specifically, 22 Wall Street analysts polled rate the stock as a buy, while 4 of the 28 advise that investors “hold,” and 0 rated it as a “Sell.”
Looking at the support for the AZN, a number of firms have released research notes about the stock. HSBC Securities stated their Buy rating for the stock in a research note on December 18, 2023, with the firm’s price target at $78.
