Backblaze (NASDAQ:BLZE) Stock Rating Raised to “Buy” at Wall Street Zen

Wall Street Zen upgraded shares of Backblaze (NASDAQ:BLZE) from a hold rating to a buy rating in a report published on Saturday,Wall Street Zen reports.

BLZE has been the topic of a number of other research reports. Needham & Company LLC restated a “buy” rating and set a $23.00 price target on shares of Backblaze in a report on Thursday, September 10th. Citizens Jmp increased their target price on shares of Backblaze from $16.00 to $21.00 and gave the stock a “market outperform” rating in a research report on Tuesday, August 4th. B. Riley Financial raised their target price on Backblaze from $16.00 to $24.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Tuesday, August 4th. Craig Hallum raised Backblaze from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating and boosted their price target for the stock from $6.50 to $16.00 in a research report on Tuesday, June 23rd. Finally, Oppenheimer upped their price target on Backblaze from $15.00 to $25.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research note on Tuesday, August 4th. Eight investment analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating, one has given a Hold rating and one has given a Sell rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $19.71.

Backblaze Trading Down 2.3%

NASDAQ:BLZE opened at $12.69 on Friday. The stock’s 50 day moving average price is $15.08 and its 200 day moving average price is $10.84. Backblaze has a 52 week low of $3.26 and a 52 week high of $23.99. The company has a market capitalization of $785.51 million, a P/E ratio of -37.32 and a beta of 1.56. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.34, a quick ratio of 1.00 and a current ratio of 1.00.

Backblaze (NASDAQ:BLZE) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Monday, August 3rd. The company reported $0.08 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.02 by $0.06. The firm had revenue of $42.71 million for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $39.94 million. Backblaze had a negative net margin of 13.07% and a negative return on equity of 16.73%. On average, research analysts forecast that Backblaze will post -0.28 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Backblaze news, CFO Marc Suidan sold 2,110 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Friday, August 21st. The shares were sold at an average price of $15.82, for a total transaction of $33,380.20. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief financial officer owned 349,518 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $5,529,374.76. The trade was a 0.60% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at the SEC website. The sale was made to cover tax withholding obligations related to the vesting of equity awards. Also, CEO Gleb Budman sold 12,855 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, August 21st. The shares were sold at an average price of $15.82, for a total transaction of $203,366.10. Following the sale, the chief executive officer owned 2,192,103 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $34,679,069.46. This trade represents a 0.58% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale is available in the SEC filing. The sale was made to cover tax withholding obligations related to the vesting of equity awards. Company insiders own 4.20% of the company’s stock.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On Backblaze

Institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in the business. AWM Investment Company Inc. bought a new stake in Backblaze during the 2nd quarter valued at approximately $22,207,000. Whetstone Capital Advisors LLC grew its holdings in Backblaze by 4.1% in the 4th quarter. Whetstone Capital Advisors LLC now owns 1,520,055 shares of the company’s stock valued at $7,083,000 after buying an additional 59,263 shares during the last quarter. Renaissance Technologies LLC increased its position in Backblaze by 44.6% in the 1st quarter. Renaissance Technologies LLC now owns 1,172,657 shares of the company’s stock worth $4,046,000 after buying an additional 361,905 shares during the period. Bank of New York Mellon Corp acquired a new position in shares of Backblaze during the second quarter worth approximately $3,074,000. Finally, Squarepoint Ops LLC lifted its holdings in shares of Backblaze by 385.1% during the second quarter. Squarepoint Ops LLC now owns 155,417 shares of the company’s stock worth $2,465,000 after buying an additional 123,382 shares during the last quarter. 54.03% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Backblaze Company Profile

Backblaze, Inc provides cloud storage and data backup services for businesses, developers, and individual customers. Its platform is designed to help organizations store, protect, manage, and access data without maintaining their own extensive physical storage infrastructure.

The company’s primary offerings include Backblaze B2 Cloud Storage, an object storage service for applications, backup systems, content delivery, and data-intensive workloads, and Backblaze Computer Backup, which automatically backs up data from computers.