Wedbush Reaffirms “Outperform” Rating for Tesla (NASDAQ:TSLA)

Tesla (NASDAQ:TSLA)‘s stock had its “outperform” rating reaffirmed by equities researchers at Wedbush in a report released on Thursday,Benzinga reports. They presently have a $550.00 target price on the electric vehicle producer’s stock. Wedbush’s price objective indicates a potential upside of 133.31% from the stock’s current price.

TSLA has been the topic of several other research reports. Bank of America dropped their target price on Tesla from $490.00 to $380.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a report on Tuesday, March 4th. UBS Group dropped their price target on Tesla from $259.00 to $225.00 and set a “sell” rating on the stock in a report on Monday, March 10th. Needham & Company LLC reaffirmed a “hold” rating on shares of Tesla in a report on Monday, February 10th. Wells Fargo & Company dropped their price target on Tesla from $135.00 to $130.00 and set an “underweight” rating on the stock in a report on Friday, March 14th. Finally, TD Cowen raised Tesla from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating and upped their price target for the company from $180.00 to $388.00 in a report on Friday, March 7th. Nine equities research analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, eight have assigned a hold rating, twenty have assigned a buy rating and two have assigned a strong buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has an average rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $319.56.

Tesla Stock Performance

TSLA stock traded down $0.12 during midday trading on Thursday, reaching $235.74. The company had a trading volume of 34,969,465 shares, compared to its average volume of 90,714,252. The company has a quick ratio of 1.61, a current ratio of 2.02 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.08. The stock has a 50 day moving average price of $341.28 and a 200 day moving average price of $320.02. Tesla has a fifty-two week low of $138.80 and a fifty-two week high of $488.54. The firm has a market capitalization of $758.26 billion, a PE ratio of 115.56, a P/E/G ratio of 5.86 and a beta of 2.50.

Tesla (NASDAQ:TSLA) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, January 29th. The electric vehicle producer reported $0.66 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $0.74 by ($0.08). Tesla had a return on equity of 10.31% and a net margin of 7.26%. Analysts anticipate that Tesla will post 2.56 earnings per share for the current year.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other Tesla news, Director James R. Murdoch sold 54,776 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, March 10th. The shares were sold at an average price of $240.79, for a total transaction of $13,189,513.04. Following the completion of the sale, the director now directly owns 477,011 shares in the company, valued at $114,859,478.69. This represents a 10.30 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at the SEC website. Also, CFO Vaibhav Taneja sold 2,672 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Thursday, March 6th. The shares were sold at an average price of $268.73, for a total transaction of $718,046.56. Following the transaction, the chief financial officer now directly owns 26,950 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $7,242,273.50. This represents a 9.02 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last three months, insiders sold 477,228 shares of company stock worth $166,849,043. Corporate insiders own 20.70% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Several hedge funds have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the business. True Wealth Design LLC grew its stake in shares of Tesla by 79.5% during the fourth quarter. True Wealth Design LLC now owns 70 shares of the electric vehicle producer’s stock valued at $28,000 after purchasing an additional 31 shares during the last quarter. Horrell Capital Management Inc. raised its holdings in Tesla by 75.6% in the fourth quarter. Horrell Capital Management Inc. now owns 79 shares of the electric vehicle producer’s stock worth $32,000 after purchasing an additional 34 shares during the period. GS Investments Inc. raised its holdings in shares of Tesla by 193.3% during the fourth quarter. GS Investments Inc. now owns 88 shares of the electric vehicle producer’s stock worth $36,000 after acquiring an additional 58 shares during the period. Navigoe LLC acquired a new stake in shares of Tesla during the fourth quarter worth $37,000. Finally, CoreFirst Bank & Trust acquired a new stake in shares of Tesla during the fourth quarter worth $38,000. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 66.20% of the company’s stock.

About Tesla

Tesla, Inc designs, develops, manufactures, leases, and sells electric vehicles, and energy generation and storage systems in the United States, China, and internationally. The company operates in two segments, Automotive, and Energy Generation and Storage. The Automotive segment offers electric vehicles, as well as sells automotive regulatory credits; and non-warranty after-sales vehicle, used vehicles, body shop and parts, supercharging, retail merchandise, and vehicle insurance services.