Hays (LON:HAS) Shares Down 6.6% – Should You Sell?

Hays plc (LON:HAS) traded down 6.6% on Wednesday . The company traded as low as GBX 30.84 and last traded at GBX 31.17. 7,877,400 shares traded hands during trading, a decline of 32% from the average session volume of 11,625,125 shares. The stock had previously closed at GBX 33.38.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of equities analysts have recently weighed in on the company. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft lowered their price target on Hays from GBX 100 to GBX 90 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a report on Wednesday, January 14th. Citigroup lowered their price target on Hays from GBX 90 to GBX 75 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a report on Friday, April 24th. Finally, Jefferies Financial Group reiterated an “underperform” rating and set a GBX 28 price target on shares of Hays in a report on Thursday, April 16th. Three investment analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating, one has assigned a Hold rating and one has issued a Sell rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, Hays has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of GBX 71.60.

Hays Stock Down 6.6%

The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 65.55, a quick ratio of 1.31 and a current ratio of 1.27. The company has a market cap of £498.33 million, a price-to-earnings ratio of -47.22, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 0.24 and a beta of 0.79. The business has a 50-day simple moving average of GBX 33.71 and a 200-day simple moving average of GBX 45.73.

Hays (LON:HAS) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Friday, February 27th. The company reported GBX 0.46 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter. Hays had a negative return on equity of 2.24% and a negative net margin of 0.16%. On average, equities analysts anticipate that Hays plc will post 4.0966184 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In related news, insider Michael Findlay purchased 25,500 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, March 2nd. The stock was purchased at an average cost of GBX 39 per share, with a total value of £9,945. Also, insider Cheryl Millington purchased 5,000 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, March 3rd. The shares were purchased at an average cost of GBX 39 per share, with a total value of £1,950. Insiders have bought a total of 36,789 shares of company stock valued at $1,390,748 over the last quarter. Company insiders own 0.76% of the company’s stock.

About Hays