The Vanguard Group, Inc. recently announced the acquisition of new stake in Block Inc (NYSE:SQ). The institutional investor has increased its shareholding in the Technology company by 1.68% to 33.75 million shares with purchase of 0.56 million shares. This fresh investment now brings its stake to 6.10% valued currently at $2.14 billion. In addition, BlackRock Fund Advisors raised its holdings by 1.33 million to 21.57 million shares.
With over 15.16 million Block Inc (SQ) shares trading Tuesday and a closing price of $72.22 on the day, the dollar volume was approximately $1.1 billion. The shares have shown a positive half year performance of 9.09% and its price on 01/02/24 lost nearly -6.63%. Currently, there are 539.41M common shares owned by the public and among those 538.26M 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: 49 analysts who have offered their price forecasts for SQ have a consensus price objective of $76.19. The analysts have set the share’s price value over the next 12 months at a high of $100.00 and a low of $40.00. The average price target is 5.21% above its recent price level and a downside to the estimated low will see the stock lose -80.55% over that period. But an upside of 27.78% will see the stock hit the forecast high price target while median target price for the stock is $77.00.
Insiders at the company have transacted a total of 147 times over the past 12 months, according to data filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). 63 of these insider trades were purchases, accounting for 1,488,963 shares. Insider sales of the common stock occurred on 84 occasions, with total insider shares sold totaling 690,528 shares.
The top 3 mutual fund holders in Block Inc are Vanguard Total Stock Market ETF, Vanguard Extended Market Index Fu, and ARK Innovation ETF. Vanguard Total Stock Market ETF owns 17.22 million shares of the company’s stock, all valued at over $1.09 billion. The company bought an additional 21018.0 shares recently to bring their total holdings to about 3.11% of the shares outstanding. Vanguard Extended Market Index Fu bought 0.13 million shares to see its total holdings expand to 7.82 million shares valued at over $496.32 million and representing 1.41% of the shares outstanding. ARK Innovation ETF sold 57434.0 shares to bring its total holdings to over 7.55 million shares at a value of $478.69 million. ARK Innovation ETF now owns shares totaling to 1.36% of the shares outstanding.
Shares of Block Inc (NYSE: SQ) opened at $75.50, down -$1.85 from a prior closing price of $77.35. However, the script later moved the day high at 75.90, down -6.63%. The company’s stock has a 5-day price change of -6.38% and 67.21% over the past three months. SQ shares are trading -6.63% year to date (YTD), with the 12-month market performance up to 14.78% higher. It has a 12-month low price of $38.85 and touched a high of $89.97 over the same period. SQ has an average intraday trading volume of 12.92 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 -0.64%, 20.84%, and 18.73% respectively.
Institutional ownership of Block Inc (NYSE: SQ) shares accounts for 59.67% of the company’s 539.41M shares outstanding. Mutual fund holders own 32.43%, while other institutional holders and individual stakeholders account for 33.96% and 1.63% respectively.
It has a market capitalization of $44.35B and a beta (3y monthly) value of 2.56. The earnings-per-share (ttm) stands at -$0.47. Price movements for the stock have been influenced by the stock’s volatility, which stands at 3.07% over the week and 3.29% over the month.
Analysts forecast that Block Inc (SQ) will achieve an EPS of $0.6 for the current quarter, $0.66 for the next quarter and $3.06 for 2024. The lowest estimate earnings-per-share for the quarter is $0.45 while analysts give the company a high EPS estimate of $0.86. Comparatively, EPS for the current quarter was $0.22 a year ago. Earnings per share for the fiscal year are expected to increase by 93.90%, and 58.53% over the next financial year. EPS should grow at an annualized rate of 68.97% over the next five years, compared to -41.34% over the past 5-year period.
If you are looking to buy this stock, then you may note that the average analyst recommendation by 49 brokerage firm advisors rate Block Inc (SQ) as a “Strong Buy” at a consensus score of 1.71. Specifically, 30 Wall Street analysts polled rate the stock as a buy, while 13 of the 49 advise that investors “hold,” and 1 rated it as a “Sell.”
Looking at the support for the SQ, a number of firms have released research notes about the stock. BMO Capital Markets stated their Outperform rating for the stock in a research note on December 05, 2023, with the firm’s price target at $84.
