Traders Purchase Large Volume of Stride Call Options (NYSE:LRN)

Stride, Inc. (NYSE:LRN) saw unusually large options trading on Wednesday. Investors bought 3,618 call options on the company. This represents an increase of approximately 170% compared to the average daily volume of 1,340 call options.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Several hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in LRN. Louisiana State Employees Retirement System lifted its holdings in shares of Stride by 2.5% in the third quarter. Louisiana State Employees Retirement System now owns 20,600 shares of the company’s stock valued at $1,757,000 after purchasing an additional 500 shares in the last quarter. International Assets Investment Management LLC lifted its holdings in shares of Stride by 8,431.7% in the third quarter. International Assets Investment Management LLC now owns 5,119 shares of the company’s stock valued at $437,000 after purchasing an additional 5,059 shares in the last quarter. Private Advisor Group LLC bought a new stake in shares of Stride in the third quarter valued at about $210,000. Retirement Guys Formula LLC bought a new stake in shares of Stride in the third quarter valued at about $203,000. Finally, Allspring Global Investments Holdings LLC lifted its holdings in shares of Stride by 634.9% in the third quarter. Allspring Global Investments Holdings LLC now owns 117,913 shares of the company’s stock valued at $10,059,000 after purchasing an additional 101,869 shares in the last quarter. 98.24% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of analysts have commented on the company. Canaccord Genuity Group raised their price objective on Stride from $94.00 to $100.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research report on Wednesday. Canaccord Genuity Group started coverage on Stride in a report on Thursday, August 8th. They issued a “buy” rating and a $94.00 target price for the company. Citigroup cut Stride from a “buy” rating to a “neutral” rating and increased their target price for the stock from $77.00 to $90.00 in a report on Tuesday, August 20th. BMO Capital Markets increased their target price on Stride from $79.00 to $82.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a report on Thursday, August 8th. Finally, StockNews.com cut Stride from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a report on Wednesday. Three equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and five have given a buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $88.50.

Stride Stock Up 39.1 %

NYSE:LRN opened at $89.72 on Thursday. Stride has a 12-month low of $43.90 and a 12-month high of $89.84. The company has a quick ratio of 4.95, a current ratio of 5.10 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.38. The firm has a market capitalization of $3.88 billion, a P/E ratio of 21.06, a P/E/G ratio of 0.74 and a beta of 0.26. The stock’s fifty day simple moving average is $79.30 and its 200-day simple moving average is $72.66.

Stride (NYSE:LRN) last posted its earnings results on Tuesday, October 22nd. The company reported $0.94 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.22 by $0.72. The firm had revenue of $551.08 million for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $504.29 million. Stride had a return on equity of 19.12% and a net margin of 10.01%. The company’s revenue for the quarter was up 14.8% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the previous year, the company posted $0.11 earnings per share. Equities research analysts expect that Stride will post 5.05 earnings per share for the current year.

Stride Company Profile

Stride, Inc, a technology-based education service company, engages in the provision of proprietary and third-party online curriculum, software systems, and educational services in the United States and internationally. Its technology-based products and services enable clients to attract, enroll, educate, track progress, support, and facilitate individualized learning for students.