Vertex (NASDAQ:VERX) Earns “Market Perform” Rating from Raymond James

Vertex (NASDAQ:VERX)‘s stock had its “market perform” rating reaffirmed by investment analysts at Raymond James in a note issued to investors on Friday, MarketBeat Ratings reports.

A number of other analysts also recently issued reports on the company. BMO Capital Markets raised their target price on Vertex from $42.00 to $52.00 and gave the stock a “market perform” rating in a research note on Thursday, November 7th. Stifel Nicolaus lifted their target price on shares of Vertex from $52.00 to $58.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Wednesday, December 18th. JMP Securities reissued a “market outperform” rating and issued a $61.00 price target on shares of Vertex in a research note on Monday, December 9th. Morgan Stanley raised their price target on shares of Vertex from $50.00 to $62.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a report on Wednesday, November 13th. Finally, DA Davidson initiated coverage on Vertex in a research report on Tuesday. They issued a “buy” rating and a $62.00 price objective for the company. Four investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, eight have assigned a buy rating and one has issued a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, Vertex presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $55.36.

Vertex Stock Down 0.3 %

VERX opened at $53.20 on Friday. The company has a market cap of $8.30 billion, a PE ratio of 295.56, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 9.83 and a beta of 0.77. Vertex has a twelve month low of $23.31 and a twelve month high of $57.74. The company has a 50-day moving average price of $51.45 and a 200 day moving average price of $42.37. The company has a quick ratio of 1.04, a current ratio of 1.04 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.29.

Vertex (NASDAQ:VERX) last announced its earnings results on Wednesday, November 6th. The company reported $0.16 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.14 by $0.02. Vertex had a return on equity of 24.92% and a net margin of 4.73%. The business had revenue of $170.40 million during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $165.70 million. During the same quarter in the prior year, the firm earned $0.06 earnings per share. The business’s revenue was up 17.5% compared to the same quarter last year. Sell-side analysts expect that Vertex will post 0.38 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other Vertex news, major shareholder Item Second Irr. Trust Fbo Kyl sold 13,346 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, December 9th. The stock was sold at an average price of $55.13, for a total value of $735,764.98. Following the sale, the insider now directly owns 1,344,754 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $74,136,288.02. This trade represents a 0.98 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through this hyperlink. Also, major shareholder Jeffrey Westphal sold 2,485,000 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, November 11th. The shares were sold at an average price of $48.90, for a total transaction of $121,516,500.00. Following the transaction, the insider now directly owns 7,895 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $386,065.50. This represents a 99.68 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last 90 days, insiders have sold 3,782,563 shares of company stock valued at $187,627,746. Corporate insiders own 44.58% of the company’s stock.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On Vertex

A number of large investors have recently bought and sold shares of VERX. Advisors Asset Management Inc. grew its position in Vertex by 126.2% during the third quarter. Advisors Asset Management Inc. now owns 968 shares of the company’s stock valued at $37,000 after acquiring an additional 540 shares during the period. Quest Partners LLC purchased a new position in Vertex in the second quarter valued at approximately $37,000. Canada Pension Plan Investment Board acquired a new position in Vertex during the second quarter valued at approximately $40,000. Amalgamated Bank acquired a new stake in shares of Vertex in the second quarter worth $68,000. Finally, KBC Group NV raised its stake in shares of Vertex by 46.1% in the 3rd quarter. KBC Group NV now owns 2,099 shares of the company’s stock valued at $81,000 after acquiring an additional 662 shares during the period. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 70.32% of the company’s stock.

About Vertex

Vertex, Inc, together with its subsidiaries, provides enterprise tax technology solutions for retail trade, wholesale trade, and manufacturing industries in the United States and internationally. The company offers tax determination; compliance and reporting, including workflow management tools, role-based security, and event logging; tax data management; document management; analytics and insights; pre-built integration that includes mapping data fields, and business logic and configurations; industry-specific solutions; and technology specific solutions, such as chain flow accelerator and SAP-specific tools.