Novartis (NYSE:NVS) Upgraded at Wall Street Zen

Wall Street Zen upgraded shares of Novartis (NYSE:NVS) from a buy rating to a strong-buy rating in a report released on Saturday.

A number of other analysts have also weighed in on the stock. Morgan Stanley raised shares of Novartis from an “underweight” rating to an “equal weight” rating and set a $123.00 price objective on the stock in a research report on Friday, August 8th. Weiss Ratings reaffirmed a “buy (b)” rating on shares of Novartis in a research report on Wednesday, October 8th. The Goldman Sachs Group reaffirmed a “sell” rating and set a $118.00 target price (down from $119.00) on shares of Novartis in a research report on Friday, September 12th. Finally, Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft reaffirmed a “buy” rating on shares of Novartis in a research report on Thursday, August 21st. One research analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, two have given a Buy rating, four have issued a Hold rating and three have assigned a Sell rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, Novartis has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $120.33.

Novartis Stock Performance

Novartis stock opened at $129.31 on Friday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.53, a current ratio of 0.82 and a quick ratio of 0.62. Novartis has a 1-year low of $96.06 and a 1-year high of $133.55. The firm has a market capitalization of $273.16 billion, a P/E ratio of 18.82, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.80 and a beta of 0.64. The company’s 50-day moving average is $125.37 and its 200 day moving average is $118.07.

Novartis (NYSE:NVS) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, July 17th. The company reported $2.42 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.38 by $0.04. Novartis had a net margin of 25.64% and a return on equity of 41.08%. The company had revenue of $14.05 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $13.94 billion. During the same period in the prior year, the company posted $1.97 EPS. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was up 12.3% on a year-over-year basis. Research analysts forecast that Novartis will post 8.45 EPS for the current year.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On Novartis

Hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently modified their holdings of the business. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP boosted its stake in Novartis by 5.2% in the first quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP now owns 8,606,724 shares of the company’s stock valued at $959,535,000 after acquiring an additional 422,869 shares in the last quarter. Fisher Asset Management LLC boosted its stake in Novartis by 5.3% in the second quarter. Fisher Asset Management LLC now owns 7,121,414 shares of the company’s stock valued at $861,762,000 after acquiring an additional 358,282 shares in the last quarter. Loomis Sayles & Co. L P boosted its stake in Novartis by 1.4% in the second quarter. Loomis Sayles & Co. L P now owns 5,581,576 shares of the company’s stock valued at $675,427,000 after acquiring an additional 78,483 shares in the last quarter. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. boosted its stake in Novartis by 60.3% in the first quarter. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. now owns 3,660,485 shares of the company’s stock valued at $408,071,000 after acquiring an additional 1,377,252 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Northern Trust Corp boosted its stake in Novartis by 2.2% in the first quarter. Northern Trust Corp now owns 2,180,281 shares of the company’s stock valued at $243,058,000 after acquiring an additional 47,690 shares in the last quarter. 13.12% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Novartis Company Profile

Novartis AG engages in the research, development, manufacture, and marketing of healthcare products in Switzerland and internationally. The company offers prescription medicines for patients and physicians. It focuses on therapeutic areas, such as cardiovascular, renal and metabolic, immunology, neuroscience, and oncology, as well as ophthalmology and hematology.