Jefferies Financial Group Inc. Takes Position in Leidos Holdings, Inc. $LDOS

Jefferies Financial Group Inc. acquired a new position in shares of Leidos Holdings, Inc. (NYSE:LDOS) in the 3rd quarter, Holdings Channel.com reports. The fund acquired 3,825 shares of the aerospace company’s stock, valued at approximately $723,000.

A number of other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also made changes to their positions in LDOS. Norges Bank acquired a new position in Leidos in the 2nd quarter worth $261,501,000. Alliancebernstein L.P. raised its stake in shares of Leidos by 64.4% in the 2nd quarter. Alliancebernstein L.P. now owns 1,529,261 shares of the aerospace company’s stock valued at $241,256,000 after purchasing an additional 598,974 shares during the period. AQR Capital Management LLC lifted its holdings in shares of Leidos by 21.2% in the second quarter. AQR Capital Management LLC now owns 1,433,712 shares of the aerospace company’s stock valued at $223,731,000 after purchasing an additional 250,555 shares in the last quarter. Hennessy Advisors Inc. lifted its holdings in shares of Leidos by 1,427.1% in the third quarter. Hennessy Advisors Inc. now owns 259,600 shares of the aerospace company’s stock valued at $49,054,000 after purchasing an additional 242,600 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Balyasny Asset Management L.P. boosted its position in shares of Leidos by 753.0% during the second quarter. Balyasny Asset Management L.P. now owns 215,939 shares of the aerospace company’s stock worth $34,067,000 after buying an additional 190,625 shares during the period. 76.12% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of equities research analysts recently issued reports on the company. Weiss Ratings reissued a “buy (b)” rating on shares of Leidos in a research report on Monday, December 29th. Robert W. Baird reduced their price target on Leidos from $215.00 to $195.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a research report on Wednesday, February 18th. Royal Bank Of Canada decreased their price target on shares of Leidos from $230.00 to $215.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a research note on Wednesday, February 18th. UBS Group set a $204.00 price objective on shares of Leidos in a report on Thursday, January 15th. Finally, Jefferies Financial Group reissued a “buy” rating and issued a $215.00 price objective on shares of Leidos in a research report on Monday, February 23rd. Nine investment analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and four have assigned a Hold rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, the company presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $214.18.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In related news, insider Elizabeth A. Porter sold 3,000 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Tuesday, January 20th. The shares were sold at an average price of $192.21, for a total transaction of $576,630.00. Following the transaction, the insider directly owned 38,575 shares in the company, valued at approximately $7,414,500.75. The trade was a 7.22% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through this hyperlink. Insiders own 0.96% of the company’s stock.

Leidos Stock Performance

LDOS opened at $173.81 on Friday. Leidos Holdings, Inc. has a 52-week low of $128.32 and a 52-week high of $205.77. The firm has a market capitalization of $21.97 billion, a PE ratio of 15.62, a PEG ratio of 1.23 and a beta of 0.63. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.93, a quick ratio of 1.58 and a current ratio of 1.70. The business’s 50-day simple moving average is $184.15 and its 200 day simple moving average is $186.34.

Leidos (NYSE:LDOS) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, February 17th. The aerospace company reported $2.76 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.57 by $0.19. The firm had revenue of $4.21 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $4.31 billion. Leidos had a return on equity of 32.95% and a net margin of 8.43%.The business’s revenue was down 3.6% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period last year, the company earned $2.37 earnings per share. Leidos has set its FY 2026 guidance at 12.050-12.450 EPS. As a group, sell-side analysts expect that Leidos Holdings, Inc. will post 10.62 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Leidos Dividend Announcement

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Tuesday, March 31st. Investors of record on Monday, March 16th will be paid a $0.43 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Monday, March 16th. This represents a $1.72 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 1.0%. Leidos’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is currently 15.45%.

Leidos Profile

Leidos is an American technology and engineering company that provides services and solutions to government and commercial customers, with a strong focus on national security, defense, intelligence, and civil government markets. The company delivers systems integration, engineering, cybersecurity, software development, data analytics, cloud migration and managed IT services, as well as mission support for complex programs. Leidos’ work spans areas such as C4ISR (command, control, communications, computers, intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance), secure communications, sensors and systems engineering, and health IT solutions for public-sector healthcare programs.

Leidos traces its corporate roots to Science Applications International Corporation (SAIC) and emerged as an independent, publicly traded company following a corporate separation in 2013.