Confluent’s (CFLT) Buy Rating Reiterated at Needham & Company LLC

Needham & Company LLC restated their buy rating on shares of Confluent (NASDAQ:CFLT) in a research note published on Friday morning,Benzinga reports. They currently have a $31.00 price objective on the stock.

Several other research firms have also commented on CFLT. UBS Group upped their price target on shares of Confluent from $23.00 to $26.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a report on Thursday, October 31st. Bank of America lowered their target price on Confluent from $32.00 to $26.00 and set an “underperform” rating on the stock in a research note on Thursday, August 1st. Scotiabank lifted their price target on Confluent from $25.00 to $27.00 and gave the company a “sector perform” rating in a research report on Thursday, October 31st. Barclays upped their price objective on Confluent from $29.00 to $32.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research report on Thursday, October 31st. Finally, JMP Securities reaffirmed a “market outperform” rating and set a $40.00 price objective on shares of Confluent in a research note on Tuesday, October 29th. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, seven have issued a hold rating, nineteen have given a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, the company has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $30.88.

Confluent Stock Performance

Shares of CFLT stock opened at $27.07 on Friday. The business has a fifty day moving average of $22.39 and a 200 day moving average of $24.56. Confluent has a 1 year low of $17.79 and a 1 year high of $35.07. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.17, a current ratio of 4.24 and a quick ratio of 4.24. The firm has a market capitalization of $8.88 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of -24.39 and a beta of 0.82.

Confluent (NASDAQ:CFLT) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, October 30th. The company reported ($0.21) earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of ($0.24) by $0.03. Confluent had a negative return on equity of 34.05% and a negative net margin of 38.35%. The firm had revenue of $250.20 million during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $243.98 million. As a group, research analysts expect that Confluent will post -0.9 earnings per share for the current year.

Insider Transactions at Confluent

In related news, CMO Stephanie Buscemi sold 3,866 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, August 20th. The stock was sold at an average price of $21.68, for a total value of $83,814.88. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief marketing officer now directly owns 161,673 shares in the company, valued at approximately $3,505,070.64. This represents a 2.34 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is accessible through this link. Also, Director Matthew Craig Miller sold 1,084,259 shares of Confluent stock in a transaction on Wednesday, November 13th. The shares were sold at an average price of $28.90, for a total value of $31,335,085.10. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 3,358,654 shares of company stock worth $91,463,207 in the last quarter. Company insiders own 13.82% of the company’s stock.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On Confluent

Hedge funds have recently modified their holdings of the business. William Blair Investment Management LLC acquired a new position in Confluent in the second quarter valued at about $193,403,000. 1832 Asset Management L.P. acquired a new position in shares of Confluent in the 1st quarter worth approximately $181,075,000. Champlain Investment Partners LLC acquired a new position in shares of Confluent in the 1st quarter worth approximately $144,563,000. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD boosted its position in shares of Confluent by 17.3% during the 1st quarter. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD now owns 17,581,914 shares of the company’s stock worth $536,601,000 after purchasing an additional 2,587,169 shares during the period. Finally, Bank of New York Mellon Corp increased its holdings in Confluent by 60.0% in the 2nd quarter. Bank of New York Mellon Corp now owns 3,510,483 shares of the company’s stock valued at $103,665,000 after purchasing an additional 1,316,804 shares during the last quarter. 78.09% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

About Confluent

Confluent, Inc operates a data streaming platform in the United States and internationally. The company provides platforms that allow customers to connect their applications, systems, and data layers, such as Confluent Cloud, a managed cloud-native software-as-a-service; and Confluent Platform, an enterprise-grade self-managed software.