Investors Buy Large Volume of C3.ai Call Options (NYSE:AI)

C3.ai, Inc. (NYSE:AI) was the recipient of some unusual options trading activity on Friday. Stock traders purchased 158,384 call options on the stock. This represents an increase of approximately 92% compared to the average volume of 82,329 call options.

C3.ai Trading Up 1.2 %

NYSE:AI opened at $22.65 on Friday. C3.ai has a twelve month low of $18.85 and a twelve month high of $45.08. The company has a market cap of $3.01 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of -10.25 and a beta of 2.03. The stock has a fifty day simple moving average of $28.42 and a 200-day simple moving average of $29.29.

C3.ai (NYSE:AI) last released its earnings results on Wednesday, February 26th. The company reported ($0.62) earnings per share for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of ($0.25) by ($0.37). The business had revenue of $98.78 million for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $98.12 million. C3.ai had a negative return on equity of 31.31% and a negative net margin of 79.17%. As a group, equities research analysts predict that C3.ai will post -2.44 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Insider Activity

In related news, CEO Thomas M. Siebel sold 552,422 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Tuesday, February 11th. The shares were sold at an average price of $33.04, for a total value of $18,252,022.88. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer now directly owns 1,336,968 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $44,173,422.72. This trade represents a 29.24 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. Also, VP Merel Witteveen sold 11,132 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Monday, December 30th. The shares were sold at an average price of $34.95, for a total transaction of $389,063.40. Following the completion of the transaction, the vice president now directly owns 4,142 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $144,762.90. This trade represents a 72.88 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 1,510,546 shares of company stock worth $43,235,262 over the last quarter. Insiders own 33.54% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Trading of C3.ai

Institutional investors and hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in the company. Brown Lisle Cummings Inc. raised its holdings in shares of C3.ai by 100.0% in the fourth quarter. Brown Lisle Cummings Inc. now owns 800 shares of the company’s stock valued at $28,000 after acquiring an additional 400 shares in the last quarter. R Squared Ltd bought a new stake in shares of C3.ai in the fourth quarter valued at about $29,000. Russell Investments Group Ltd. raised its holdings in shares of C3.ai by 100.7% in the fourth quarter. Russell Investments Group Ltd. now owns 909 shares of the company’s stock valued at $31,000 after acquiring an additional 456 shares in the last quarter. WealthTrak Capital Management LLC bought a new stake in shares of C3.ai in the fourth quarter valued at about $33,000. Finally, CENTRAL TRUST Co bought a new stake in shares of C3.ai in the fourth quarter valued at about $34,000. 38.96% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

AI has been the subject of a number of recent research reports. KeyCorp cut their target price on shares of C3.ai from $29.00 to $21.00 and set an “underweight” rating for the company in a report on Thursday, February 27th. Northland Securities lifted their price objective on shares of C3.ai from $35.00 to $45.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research note on Tuesday, December 10th. Morgan Stanley dropped their price objective on shares of C3.ai from $32.00 to $30.00 and set an “underweight” rating for the company in a research note on Thursday, February 27th. JMP Securities lifted their price objective on shares of C3.ai from $40.00 to $55.00 and gave the stock a “market outperform” rating in a research note on Tuesday, December 10th. Finally, StockNews.com raised shares of C3.ai to a “sell” rating in a research note on Tuesday, November 26th. Five investment analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, five have issued a hold rating, four have issued a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock has an average rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $31.33.

About C3.ai

C3.ai, Inc operates as an enterprise artificial intelligence (AI) software company in North America, Europe, the Middle East, Africa, the Asia Pacific, and internationally. The company provides C3 AI platform, an application development and runtime environment that enables customers to design, develop, and deploy enterprise AI applications; C3 AI Ex Machina for analysis-ready data; C3 AI CRM, an industry specific customer relationship management solution; and C3 Generative AI Product Suite that enables to locate, retrieve, and present information.