Adobe (NASDAQ:ADBE) Hits New 12-Month Low Following Analyst Downgrade

Adobe Inc. (NASDAQ:ADBE)’s stock price reached a new 52-week low during trading on Thursday after JPMorgan Chase & Co. lowered their price target on the stock from $580.00 to $540.00. JPMorgan Chase & Co. currently has an overweight rating on the stock. Adobe traded as low as $389.11 and last traded at $393.38, with a volume of 2541108 shares trading hands. The stock had previously closed at $438.60.

Other equities research analysts have also recently issued reports about the company. UBS Group dropped their target price on Adobe from $475.00 to $460.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a research report on Thursday. BMO Capital Markets cut their target price on shares of Adobe from $515.00 to $495.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a research note on Thursday. Jefferies Financial Group cut their target price on shares of Adobe from $700.00 to $650.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research note on Thursday, December 12th. KeyCorp cut their target price on shares of Adobe from $450.00 to $390.00 and set an “underweight” rating for the company in a research note on Thursday. Finally, Royal Bank of Canada cut their target price on shares of Adobe from $550.00 to $530.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a research note on Thursday. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, eleven have assigned a hold rating, seventeen have issued a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the company currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $539.46.

Insider Activity

In other news, EVP Scott Belsky sold 922 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Friday, January 24th. The stock was sold at an average price of $437.28, for a total value of $403,172.16. Following the transaction, the executive vice president now owns 22,153 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $9,687,063.84. This represents a 4.00 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available at this hyperlink. Also, CAO Jillian Forusz sold 334 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Tuesday, January 28th. The shares were sold at an average price of $435.83, for a total value of $145,567.22. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief accounting officer now directly owns 2,685 shares in the company, valued at approximately $1,170,203.55. This trade represents a 11.06 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 5,075 shares of company stock valued at $2,191,826 in the last quarter. Insiders own 0.15% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Several hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently modified their holdings of the company. PKO Investment Management Joint Stock Co purchased a new position in shares of Adobe during the fourth quarter worth $7,115,000. Northstar Financial Companies Inc. purchased a new position in shares of Adobe during the fourth quarter worth $241,000. Centaurus Financial Inc. boosted its position in shares of Adobe by 34.8% during the fourth quarter. Centaurus Financial Inc. now owns 3,613 shares of the software company’s stock worth $1,606,000 after buying an additional 932 shares during the period. Lighthouse Financial LLC purchased a new position in shares of Adobe during the fourth quarter worth $218,000. Finally, Copia Wealth Management acquired a new position in shares of Adobe in the fourth quarter worth $28,000. 81.79% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Adobe Trading Down 13.9 %

The company’s 50 day simple moving average is $437.74 and its 200 day simple moving average is $483.80. The firm has a market cap of $164.51 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 30.47, a P/E/G ratio of 2.15 and a beta of 1.37. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.29, a current ratio of 1.07 and a quick ratio of 1.07.

Adobe (NASDAQ:ADBE) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, March 12th. The software company reported $5.08 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $4.97 by $0.11. The business had revenue of $5.71 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $5.66 billion. Adobe had a net margin of 25.85% and a return on equity of 45.87%. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm posted $4.48 earnings per share. As a group, research analysts expect that Adobe Inc. will post 16.65 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

About Adobe

Adobe Inc, together with its subsidiaries, operates as a diversified software company worldwide. It operates through three segments: Digital Media, Digital Experience, and Publishing and Advertising. The Digital Media segment offers products, services, and solutions that enable individuals, teams, and enterprises to create, publish, and promote content; and Document Cloud, a unified cloud-based document services platform.