Granite Construction Incorporated (NYSE:GVA) Sees Significant Decrease in Short Interest

Granite Construction Incorporated (NYSE:GVA) saw a significant decline in short interest in October. As of October 31st, there was short interest totalling 4,240,000 shares, a decline of 6.4% from the October 15th total of 4,530,000 shares. Currently, 9.8% of the shares of the stock are short sold. Based on an average daily trading volume, of 636,200 shares, the short-interest ratio is currently 6.7 days.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Separately, The Goldman Sachs Group raised their price objective on Granite Construction from $61.00 to $70.00 and gave the stock a “sell” rating in a research note on Wednesday, October 9th.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On Granite Construction

A number of institutional investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the stock. Rothschild Investment LLC acquired a new stake in Granite Construction in the second quarter valued at approximately $33,000. Blue Trust Inc. lifted its stake in shares of Granite Construction by 66.4% in the 3rd quarter. Blue Trust Inc. now owns 902 shares of the construction company’s stock valued at $72,000 after acquiring an additional 360 shares during the last quarter. Headlands Technologies LLC bought a new stake in Granite Construction during the 2nd quarter worth $107,000. GAMMA Investing LLC increased its holdings in Granite Construction by 82.5% in the 3rd quarter. GAMMA Investing LLC now owns 2,007 shares of the construction company’s stock worth $159,000 after purchasing an additional 907 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Point72 DIFC Ltd bought a new position in Granite Construction in the third quarter valued at about $203,000.

Granite Construction Price Performance

GVA stock opened at $96.43 on Tuesday. The company’s 50-day moving average price is $83.08 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $71.40. The firm has a market cap of $4.21 billion, a P/E ratio of 44.23 and a beta of 1.39. The company has a quick ratio of 1.46, a current ratio of 1.56 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.69. Granite Construction has a 12 month low of $43.92 and a 12 month high of $99.32.

Granite Construction (NYSE:GVA) last released its earnings results on Thursday, October 31st. The construction company reported $2.05 earnings per share for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $2.51 by ($0.46). Granite Construction had a return on equity of 19.04% and a net margin of 2.80%. The business had revenue of $1.28 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $1.29 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the company earned $1.69 earnings per share. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was up 14.2% on a year-over-year basis. On average, analysts anticipate that Granite Construction will post 4.98 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Granite Construction Dividend Announcement

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Tuesday, October 15th. Stockholders of record on Monday, September 30th were paid a $0.13 dividend. The ex-dividend date was Monday, September 30th. This represents a $0.52 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.54%. Granite Construction’s payout ratio is currently 23.85%.

About Granite Construction

Granite Construction Incorporated operates as an infrastructure contractor in the United States. It operates through two segments: Construction and Materials segments. The Construction segment engages in the construction and rehabilitation of roads, pavement preservation, bridges, rail lines, airports, marine ports, dams, reservoirs, aqueducts, infrastructure, and site development for use by the public and water-related construction for municipal agencies, commercial water suppliers, industrial facilities, and energy companies; and construction of various complex projects, including infrastructure/site development, mining, public safety, tunnel, solar storage, and power related projects.