CoStar Group’s (CSGP) “Buy” Rating Reiterated at Needham & Company LLC

Needham & Company LLC reiterated their buy rating on shares of CoStar Group (NASDAQ:CSGP) in a report released on Monday morning,Benzinga reports. The brokerage currently has a $100.00 target price on the technology company’s stock.

CSGP has been the subject of a number of other research reports. Royal Bank of Canada downgraded CoStar Group from an “outperform” rating to a “sector perform” rating and decreased their target price for the company from $96.00 to $83.00 in a report on Wednesday, October 23rd. JPMorgan Chase & Co. decreased their target price on CoStar Group from $108.00 to $99.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a report on Wednesday, October 23rd. Citigroup decreased their target price on CoStar Group from $97.00 to $90.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a report on Thursday, October 24th. BMO Capital Markets decreased their target price on CoStar Group from $78.00 to $75.00 and set a “market perform” rating for the company in a report on Thursday, October 24th. Finally, StockNews.com downgraded CoStar Group from a “hold” rating to a “sell” rating in a report on Monday, October 28th. One analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, four have issued a hold rating and ten have issued a buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $93.25.

CoStar Group Stock Performance

NASDAQ:CSGP opened at $77.58 on Monday. The firm has a market cap of $31.80 billion, a PE ratio of 176.36 and a beta of 0.83. CoStar Group has a fifty-two week low of $68.26 and a fifty-two week high of $100.38. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.13, a quick ratio of 9.63 and a current ratio of 9.63. The business has a 50 day moving average price of $76.30 and a 200-day moving average price of $76.08.

CoStar Group (NASDAQ:CSGP) last released its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, October 22nd. The technology company reported $0.22 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.16 by $0.06. The firm had revenue of $692.60 million during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $695.91 million. CoStar Group had a return on equity of 3.53% and a net margin of 6.57%. The business’s quarterly revenue was up 10.9% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the prior year, the firm posted $0.25 earnings per share. Equities research analysts predict that CoStar Group will post 0.52 earnings per share for the current year.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, insider Michael J. Desmarais sold 5,500 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Tuesday, November 26th. The stock was sold at an average price of $79.88, for a total transaction of $439,340.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the insider now directly owns 58,798 shares in the company, valued at $4,696,784.24. This trade represents a 8.55 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through the SEC website. Also, Director Michael R. Klein sold 71,633 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Friday, October 25th. The shares were sold at an average price of $74.69, for a total value of $5,350,268.77. Following the transaction, the director now owns 1,913,501 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $142,919,389.69. The trade was a 3.61 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. 1.57% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On CoStar Group

Several institutional investors and hedge funds have recently modified their holdings of the stock. Sequoia Financial Advisors LLC boosted its position in shares of CoStar Group by 9.3% during the second quarter. Sequoia Financial Advisors LLC now owns 5,928 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $439,000 after buying an additional 504 shares during the last quarter. Diversified Trust Co purchased a new stake in shares of CoStar Group during the second quarter valued at $202,000. V Square Quantitative Management LLC boosted its position in shares of CoStar Group by 54.5% during the second quarter. V Square Quantitative Management LLC now owns 3,775 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $280,000 after buying an additional 1,332 shares during the last quarter. Envestnet Portfolio Solutions Inc. boosted its position in shares of CoStar Group by 8.5% during the second quarter. Envestnet Portfolio Solutions Inc. now owns 52,684 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $3,906,000 after buying an additional 4,143 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Assenagon Asset Management S.A. boosted its position in shares of CoStar Group by 248.2% during the second quarter. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. now owns 369,291 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $27,379,000 after buying an additional 263,234 shares during the last quarter. 96.60% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

About CoStar Group

CoStar Group, Inc provides information, analytics, and online marketplace services to the commercial real estate, hospitality, residential, and related professionals industries in the United States, Canada, Europe, the Asia Pacific, and Latin America. The company offers CoStar Property that provides inventory of office, industrial, retail, multifamily, hospitality, and student housing properties and land; CoStar Sales, a robust database of comparable commercial real estate sales transactions; CoStar Market Analytics to view and report on aggregated market and submarket trends; and CoStar Tenant, an online business-to-business prospecting and analytical tool that provides tenant information.