Traders Buy High Volume of Call Options on B. Riley Financial (NASDAQ:RILY)

B. Riley Financial, Inc. (NASDAQ:RILY) saw some unusual options trading on Thursday. Investors acquired 21,615 call options on the company. This represents an increase of 46% compared to the typical volume of 14,813 call options.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On B. Riley Financial

A number of large investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in RILY. Farther Finance Advisors LLC acquired a new stake in shares of B. Riley Financial in the third quarter valued at approximately $25,000. Bank of America Corp DE boosted its stake in shares of B. Riley Financial by 237.2% in the third quarter. Bank of America Corp DE now owns 6,963 shares of the asset manager’s stock valued at $42,000 after buying an additional 4,898 shares during the period. Russell Investments Group Ltd. boosted its stake in shares of B. Riley Financial by 144.9% in the second quarter. Russell Investments Group Ltd. now owns 14,504 shares of the asset manager’s stock valued at $43,000 after buying an additional 8,582 shares during the period. Jump Financial LLC acquired a new stake in B. Riley Financial during the second quarter worth approximately $45,000. Finally, Magnus Financial Group LLC acquired a new stake in B. Riley Financial during the fourth quarter worth approximately $47,000. Institutional investors own 50.20% of the company’s stock.

B. Riley Financial Price Performance

RILY stock traded down $0.10 during midday trading on Thursday, hitting $7.15. The company’s stock had a trading volume of 661,916 shares, compared to its average volume of 1,316,950. The company’s fifty day moving average price is $7.67 and its 200 day moving average price is $6.17. B. Riley Financial has a twelve month low of $2.67 and a twelve month high of $10.97. The stock has a market capitalization of $223.22 million, a P/E ratio of 1.01 and a beta of 1.27.

B. Riley Financial (NASDAQ:RILY) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, January 14th. The asset manager reported $2.91 EPS for the quarter. The business had revenue of $75.70 million for the quarter.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of analysts have recently commented on RILY shares. Weiss Ratings reissued a “sell (e+)” rating on shares of B. Riley Financial in a report on Monday, December 29th. Wall Street Zen lowered B. Riley Financial from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a report on Saturday, March 21st. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a Sell rating, Based on data from MarketBeat, B. Riley Financial has a consensus rating of “Sell”.

About B. Riley Financial

B. Riley Financial, Inc, headquartered in Los Angeles, California, is a diversified financial services company offering a broad range of advisory and investment solutions to individual, corporate and institutional clients. Since its founding in 1997 by Bryant E. Riley, the firm has expanded its capabilities across two primary segments: financial solutions and operations solutions. Its financial solutions segment provides investment banking services, equity research, merger and acquisition advisory, corporate finance, restructuring advisory and private capital solutions.

In addition to traditional investment banking, B.