e.l.f. Beauty (NYSE:ELF) Upgraded by Morgan Stanley to “Overweight” Rating

Morgan Stanley upgraded shares of e.l.f. Beauty (NYSE:ELF) from an equal weight rating to an overweight rating in a research report released on Monday morning, MarketBeat reports. Morgan Stanley currently has $153.00 price objective on the stock, up from their previous price objective of $139.00.

Other research analysts have also recently issued research reports about the company. Robert W. Baird lowered their target price on e.l.f. Beauty from $240.00 to $175.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a research note on Monday, October 21st. Stifel Nicolaus lowered their target price on e.l.f. Beauty from $131.00 to $115.00 and set a “hold” rating for the company in a research note on Thursday, November 7th. Bank of America lowered their target price on e.l.f. Beauty from $190.00 to $165.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research note on Tuesday, October 15th. Piper Sandler raised their target price on e.l.f. Beauty from $165.00 to $167.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research note on Monday, January 6th. Finally, Truist Financial lifted their price objective on e.l.f. Beauty from $130.00 to $150.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Wednesday, December 18th. One analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, two have assigned a hold rating, fourteen have assigned a buy rating and two have issued a strong buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat, e.l.f. Beauty has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $172.76.

e.l.f. Beauty Trading Up 5.9 %

NYSE ELF opened at $132.23 on Monday. e.l.f. Beauty has a fifty-two week low of $98.50 and a fifty-two week high of $221.83. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.22, a quick ratio of 1.01 and a current ratio of 1.78. The stock has a 50 day simple moving average of $127.78 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $138.59. The stock has a market cap of $7.45 billion, a P/E ratio of 71.48, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.08 and a beta of 1.50.

e.l.f. Beauty (NYSE:ELF) last released its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, November 6th. The company reported $0.77 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.43 by $0.34. e.l.f. Beauty had a return on equity of 19.34% and a net margin of 8.87%. The business had revenue of $301.10 million during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $289.43 million. During the same quarter last year, the business posted $0.66 EPS. The business’s revenue was up 39.7% on a year-over-year basis. On average, analysts forecast that e.l.f. Beauty will post 2.8 earnings per share for the current year.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other e.l.f. Beauty news, Director Maureen C. Watson sold 785 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, November 29th. The stock was sold at an average price of $130.00, for a total transaction of $102,050.00. Following the completion of the sale, the director now owns 1,888 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $245,440. The trade was a 29.37 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is accessible through the SEC website. Also, insider Scott Milsten sold 530 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, December 6th. The shares were sold at an average price of $137.60, for a total value of $72,928.00. Following the sale, the insider now directly owns 68,853 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $9,474,172.80. This represents a 0.76 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold 2,205 shares of company stock valued at $297,442 over the last 90 days. Company insiders own 3.50% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Trading of e.l.f. Beauty

Hedge funds have recently bought and sold shares of the stock. Canada Pension Plan Investment Board bought a new stake in e.l.f. Beauty during the second quarter valued at about $6,659,000. Sumitomo Mitsui Trust Group Inc. grew its holdings in e.l.f. Beauty by 1,380.4% during the third quarter. Sumitomo Mitsui Trust Group Inc. now owns 16,284 shares of the company’s stock valued at $1,775,000 after purchasing an additional 15,184 shares during the period. Cetera Investment Advisers grew its holdings in e.l.f. Beauty by 33.8% during the second quarter. Cetera Investment Advisers now owns 39,319 shares of the company’s stock valued at $8,285,000 after purchasing an additional 9,939 shares during the period. Clearbridge Investments LLC grew its holdings in e.l.f. Beauty by 84.4% during the second quarter. Clearbridge Investments LLC now owns 1,259,644 shares of the company’s stock valued at $265,432,000 after purchasing an additional 576,383 shares during the period. Finally, Congress Asset Management Co. grew its holdings in e.l.f. Beauty by 14.2% during the third quarter. Congress Asset Management Co. now owns 503,577 shares of the company’s stock valued at $54,905,000 after purchasing an additional 62,480 shares during the period. Institutional investors own 92.44% of the company’s stock.

e.l.f. Beauty Company Profile

e.l.f. Beauty, Inc is a holding company, which engages in the provision of inclusive, accessible, clean, vegan and cruelty free cosmetics and skin care products. The company focuses on the e-commerce, national retailers and international business channels. Its brands include elf, elf skin, WELL People and KEYS soulcare.