Teacher Retirement System of Texas Raises Stake in Certara, Inc. $CERT

Teacher Retirement System of Texas grew its stake in shares of Certara, Inc. (NASDAQ:CERT) by 25.3% in the second quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The firm owned 5,674,485 shares of the company’s stock after purchasing an additional 1,145,554 shares during the quarter. Teacher Retirement System of Texas owned approximately 3.50% of Certara worth $66,391,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Other large investors have also recently made changes to their positions in the company. Janney Montgomery Scott LLC purchased a new stake in shares of Certara during the first quarter valued at $120,000. Illinois Municipal Retirement Fund boosted its stake in shares of Certara by 3.9% during the first quarter. Illinois Municipal Retirement Fund now owns 59,721 shares of the company’s stock valued at $591,000 after purchasing an additional 2,268 shares during the period. Northern Trust Corp boosted its stake in shares of Certara by 4.5% during the first quarter. Northern Trust Corp now owns 916,299 shares of the company’s stock valued at $9,071,000 after purchasing an additional 39,289 shares during the period. Dynamic Technology Lab Private Ltd purchased a new stake in shares of Certara during the first quarter valued at $297,000. Finally, Principal Financial Group Inc. boosted its stake in shares of Certara by 2.4% during the first quarter. Principal Financial Group Inc. now owns 543,958 shares of the company’s stock valued at $5,385,000 after purchasing an additional 12,513 shares during the period. 73.96% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of analysts have recently issued reports on the stock. Zacks Research raised shares of Certara from a “strong sell” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Friday, September 5th. Weiss Ratings reaffirmed a “sell (d)” rating on shares of Certara in a research note on Friday. Morgan Stanley began coverage on shares of Certara in a research note on Thursday, July 3rd. They issued an “equal weight” rating and a $16.00 price objective for the company. KeyCorp upped their price objective on shares of Certara from $15.00 to $16.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Wednesday, October 8th. Finally, Barclays upped their price objective on shares of Certara from $14.00 to $16.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Thursday, October 2nd. Six analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating, five have given a Hold rating and one has assigned a Sell rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, the company presently has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $15.63.

Insider Activity at Certara

In other Certara news, insider Leif E. Pedersen sold 51,224 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, September 9th. The shares were sold at an average price of $10.92, for a total transaction of $559,366.08. Following the completion of the sale, the insider directly owned 73,979 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $807,850.68. This represents a 40.91% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. Insiders own 2.33% of the company’s stock.

Certara Stock Performance

CERT stock opened at $12.66 on Monday. The firm has a market cap of $2.03 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 253.25 and a beta of 1.45. The firm has a 50-day simple moving average of $11.68 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $11.62. Certara, Inc. has a one year low of $8.64 and a one year high of $15.69. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.27, a quick ratio of 2.16 and a current ratio of 2.16.

Certara (NASDAQ:CERT) last released its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, August 6th. The company reported $0.07 EPS for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $0.10 by ($0.03). The firm had revenue of $104.57 million for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $104.14 million. Certara had a net margin of 1.97% and a return on equity of 5.11%. The business’s quarterly revenue was up 12.1% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the previous year, the company posted $0.07 earnings per share. On average, equities analysts forecast that Certara, Inc. will post 0.28 EPS for the current fiscal year.

About Certara

Certara, Inc, together with its subsidiaries, provides software products and technology-enabled services to customers for biosimulation in drug discovery, preclinical and clinical research, regulatory submissions, and market access in the United States and internationally. It offers solutions for model-informed drug development, as well as biosimulation solution used to predict both pharmacokinetics and pharmacodynamics.