Illumina Target of Unusually Large Options Trading (NASDAQ:ILMN)

Illumina, Inc. (NASDAQ:ILMN) was the target of unusually large options trading activity on Tuesday. Stock investors purchased 6,321 put options on the company. This is an increase of 50% compared to the average daily volume of 4,204 put options.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Illumina news, CEO Jacob Thaysen bought 7,330 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Thursday, February 22nd. The shares were purchased at an average price of $135.29 per share, for a total transaction of $991,675.70. Following the purchase, the chief executive officer now directly owns 14,861 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $2,010,544.69. The acquisition was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available through this link. 0.17% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Illumina

Large investors have recently bought and sold shares of the business. Vanguard Group Inc. grew its holdings in Illumina by 15.0% during the third quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 17,967,758 shares of the life sciences company’s stock valued at $2,466,614,000 after purchasing an additional 2,336,935 shares during the period. Capital World Investors bought a new position in shares of Illumina in the 4th quarter valued at about $271,753,000. Norges Bank purchased a new position in Illumina in the fourth quarter worth about $264,636,000. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD increased its stake in Illumina by 268.1% during the fourth quarter. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD now owns 2,113,230 shares of the life sciences company’s stock worth $427,295,000 after acquiring an additional 1,539,186 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Barclays PLC raised its position in Illumina by 120.0% during the third quarter. Barclays PLC now owns 1,768,355 shares of the life sciences company’s stock valued at $242,758,000 after purchasing an additional 964,709 shares during the period. 89.42% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several equities research analysts have recently issued reports on the company. TD Cowen lowered Illumina from an “outperform” rating to a “market perform” rating and set a $144.00 target price for the company. in a research report on Thursday, January 4th. StockNews.com raised shares of Illumina from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a research report on Friday, February 16th. Royal Bank of Canada reiterated an “outperform” rating and issued a $253.00 target price on shares of Illumina in a research note on Tuesday, April 9th. Barclays boosted their target price on Illumina from $85.00 to $100.00 and gave the company an “underweight” rating in a research note on Wednesday, April 10th. Finally, Stephens reiterated an “overweight” rating and set a $170.00 price target on shares of Illumina in a research note on Wednesday, April 10th. Two equities research analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, nine have assigned a hold rating and nine have assigned a buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, Illumina currently has an average rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $167.70.

Illumina Price Performance

Shares of ILMN stock opened at $118.29 on Thursday. The business’s fifty day moving average is $134.31 and its 200 day moving average is $128.15. The company has a quick ratio of 1.29, a current ratio of 1.66 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.26. The stock has a market cap of $18.84 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of -16.12 and a beta of 1.19. Illumina has a twelve month low of $89.00 and a twelve month high of $232.23.

Illumina (NASDAQ:ILMN) last released its earnings results on Thursday, February 8th. The life sciences company reported $0.14 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.01 by $0.13. Illumina had a negative net margin of 25.78% and a positive return on equity of 2.20%. The firm had revenue of $1.12 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $1.09 billion. During the same period in the prior year, the firm earned $0.14 EPS. The company’s revenue was up 3.6% compared to the same quarter last year. Research analysts expect that Illumina will post 0.91 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Illumina Company Profile

Illumina, Inc offers sequencing- and array-based solutions for genetic and genomic analysis in the United States, Singapore, the United Kingdom, and internationally. It operates through Core Illumina and GRAIL segments. The company offers sequencing and array-based instruments and consumables, which include reagents, flow cells, and library preparation; whole-genome sequencing kits, which sequence entire genomes of various size and complexity; and targeted resequencing kits, which sequence exomes, specific genes, and RNA or other genomic regions of interest.