GDS (NASDAQ:GDS) Shares Up 6.3% – Time to Buy?

Shares of GDS Holdings Limited (NASDAQ:GDS) traded up 6.3% on Tuesday . The company traded as high as $21.69 and last traded at $21.69. 1,144,793 shares changed hands during trading, a decline of 29% from the average session volume of 1,620,078 shares. The stock had previously closed at $20.40.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

GDS has been the topic of several recent analyst reports. Bank of America lifted their price objective on shares of GDS from $12.40 to $22.40 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Tuesday, August 27th. Royal Bank of Canada upgraded shares of GDS from a “sector perform” rating to an “outperform” rating and increased their target price for the stock from $13.00 to $14.00 in a report on Monday, July 8th. Finally, Nomura Securities raised shares of GDS to a “strong-buy” rating in a report on Monday, August 26th. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, one has issued a hold rating, three have assigned a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, the stock has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $15.29.

GDS Stock Down 8.7 %

The company has a current ratio of 1.39, a quick ratio of 1.39 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 2.30. The stock’s 50-day moving average price is $15.50 and its 200-day moving average price is $11.04. The stock has a market cap of $4.00 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of -6.60 and a beta of 0.24.

GDS (NASDAQ:GDS) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, August 21st. The company reported ($0.18) earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of ($0.25) by $0.07. GDS had a negative net margin of 39.96% and a negative return on equity of 9.10%. The business had revenue of $388.92 million during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $384.14 million. On average, sell-side analysts expect that GDS Holdings Limited will post -1.14 earnings per share for the current year.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On GDS

A number of institutional investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the business. Canada Pension Plan Investment Board raised its holdings in GDS by 0.4% during the 1st quarter. Canada Pension Plan Investment Board now owns 9,713,325 shares of the company’s stock valued at $64,594,000 after buying an additional 33,978 shares during the last quarter. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. boosted its holdings in shares of GDS by 16.7% during the fourth quarter. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. now owns 5,404,486 shares of the company’s stock worth $49,289,000 after purchasing an additional 773,378 shares during the period. Baupost Group LLC MA grew its stake in shares of GDS by 63.5% in the second quarter. Baupost Group LLC MA now owns 4,249,952 shares of the company’s stock worth $39,482,000 after purchasing an additional 1,649,952 shares during the last quarter. Farallon Capital Management LLC increased its holdings in GDS by 72.7% during the 2nd quarter. Farallon Capital Management LLC now owns 1,226,133 shares of the company’s stock valued at $11,391,000 after purchasing an additional 516,133 shares during the period. Finally, Pacer Advisors Inc. raised its position in GDS by 17.3% during the 2nd quarter. Pacer Advisors Inc. now owns 849,568 shares of the company’s stock valued at $7,892,000 after purchasing an additional 125,395 shares during the last quarter. 33.71% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

About GDS

GDS Holdings Limited, together with its subsidiaries, develops and operates data centers in the People's Republic of China. The company provides colocation services comprising critical facilities space, customer-available power, racks, and cooling; managed hosting services, including business continuity and disaster recovery, network management, data storage, system security, operating system, database, and server middleware services; managed cloud services; and consulting services.