AXT’s (AXTI) Buy Rating Reaffirmed at Needham & Company LLC

AXT (NASDAQ:AXTI)‘s stock had its “buy” rating reaffirmed by equities research analysts at Needham & Company LLC in a research report issued on Friday,Benzinga reports. They presently have a $5.00 price objective on the semiconductor company’s stock. Needham & Company LLC’s target price points to a potential upside of 118.34% from the company’s previous close.

Several other brokerages also recently commented on AXTI. Wedbush reaffirmed an “outperform” rating and set a $5.50 target price on shares of AXT in a report on Friday, February 7th. Northland Securities reduced their price objective on AXT from $6.00 to $5.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a research note on Friday, November 1st. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating and five have issued a buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat, the stock has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $5.20.

AXT Trading Down 0.4 %

AXTI stock opened at $2.29 on Friday. AXT has a 12-month low of $1.73 and a 12-month high of $5.64. The stock’s 50 day simple moving average is $2.19 and its 200 day simple moving average is $2.30. The firm has a market cap of $102.48 million, a P/E ratio of -9.16 and a beta of 2.08.

AXT (NASDAQ:AXTI) last announced its earnings results on Thursday, February 20th. The semiconductor company reported ($0.12) earnings per share for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of ($0.04) by ($0.08). AXT had a negative net margin of 10.73% and a negative return on equity of 4.58%. On average, research analysts forecast that AXT will post -0.22 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Institutional Trading of AXT

Several institutional investors have recently bought and sold shares of the stock. Creative Planning acquired a new position in AXT in the third quarter worth $127,000. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. lifted its stake in shares of AXT by 26.5% during the third quarter. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. now owns 63,794 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock valued at $154,000 after acquiring an additional 13,376 shares during the period. GSA Capital Partners LLP lifted its stake in shares of AXT by 25.1% during the third quarter. GSA Capital Partners LLP now owns 301,812 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock valued at $730,000 after acquiring an additional 60,623 shares during the period. Connor Clark & Lunn Investment Management Ltd. lifted its stake in shares of AXT by 10.0% during the third quarter. Connor Clark & Lunn Investment Management Ltd. now owns 606,417 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock valued at $1,468,000 after acquiring an additional 54,891 shares during the period. Finally, Systematic Financial Management LP increased its holdings in AXT by 13.0% in the third quarter. Systematic Financial Management LP now owns 1,477,169 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock valued at $3,575,000 after purchasing an additional 169,406 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 49.52% of the company’s stock.

About AXT

AXT, Inc designs, develops, manufactures, and distributes compound and single element semiconductor substrates. The company offers indium phosphide for use in data center connectivity using light/lasers, high-speed data transfer in data centers, 5G communications, fiber optic lasers and detectors, consumer devices, passive optical networks, silicon photonics, photonic integrated circuits, thermo-photovoltaics, RF amplifier and switching, infrared light-emitting diode (LEDS) motion control, lidar for robotics and autonomous vehicles, and infrared thermal imaging.