Morgan Stanley Has Lowered Expectations for Workday (NASDAQ:WDAY) Stock Price

Workday (NASDAQ:WDAY) had its price target cut by stock analysts at Morgan Stanley from $275.00 to $250.00 in a report issued on Wednesday,Benzinga reports. The brokerage presently has an “equal weight” rating on the software maker’s stock. Morgan Stanley’s price objective suggests a potential upside of 13.11% from the company’s previous close.

A number of other research analysts also recently weighed in on the stock. Guggenheim restated a “neutral” rating on shares of Workday in a research report on Wednesday, February 26th. BMO Capital Markets increased their price target on Workday from $300.00 to $314.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a report on Thursday, February 27th. DA Davidson cut their price objective on Workday from $270.00 to $230.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a report on Monday. JMP Securities reissued a “market outperform” rating and issued a $315.00 target price on shares of Workday in a report on Thursday, February 6th. Finally, Stifel Nicolaus boosted their price target on Workday from $270.00 to $310.00 and gave the company a “hold” rating in a research note on Wednesday, February 26th. Ten research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twenty have issued a buy rating and two have given a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, Workday presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $296.25.

Workday Stock Performance

WDAY stock opened at $221.02 on Wednesday. The stock’s 50 day simple moving average is $244.84 and its 200 day simple moving average is $252.32. The company has a current ratio of 2.05, a quick ratio of 2.05 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.35. Workday has a 12-month low of $199.81 and a 12-month high of $294.00. The stock has a market capitalization of $58.79 billion, a PE ratio of 36.65, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.55 and a beta of 1.32.

Workday (NASDAQ:WDAY) last released its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, February 25th. The software maker reported $0.48 EPS for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $1.75 by ($1.27). Workday had a net margin of 19.86% and a return on equity of 6.13%. The business had revenue of $2.21 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $2.18 billion. As a group, research analysts forecast that Workday will post 2.63 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, CAO Mark S. Garfield sold 497 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Thursday, April 10th. The shares were sold at an average price of $226.55, for a total value of $112,595.35. Following the sale, the chief accounting officer now directly owns 34,385 shares in the company, valued at $7,789,921.75. The trade was a 1.42 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available at the SEC website. Also, major shareholder David A. Duffield sold 81,275 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, April 8th. The shares were sold at an average price of $214.68, for a total transaction of $17,448,117.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the insider now directly owns 102,997 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $22,111,395.96. The trade was a 44.11 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 321,724 shares of company stock valued at $77,976,126 in the last quarter. 20.00% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Workday

Large investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the stock. Vanguard Group Inc. boosted its holdings in shares of Workday by 28.9% in the 4th quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 20,142,800 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $5,197,447,000 after purchasing an additional 4,517,272 shares during the period. T. Rowe Price Investment Management Inc. purchased a new position in Workday during the fourth quarter worth $658,735,000. Norges Bank bought a new position in Workday during the fourth quarter valued at $645,710,000. Parnassus Investments LLC increased its position in Workday by 562.2% during the fourth quarter. Parnassus Investments LLC now owns 2,447,735 shares of the software maker’s stock valued at $631,589,000 after acquiring an additional 2,078,097 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Geode Capital Management LLC lifted its holdings in shares of Workday by 61.9% in the 4th quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 4,637,387 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $1,193,105,000 after acquiring an additional 1,772,223 shares during the last quarter. 89.81% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

About Workday

Workday, Inc provides enterprise cloud applications in the United States and internationally. Its applications help its customers to plan, execute, analyze, and extend to other applications and environments to manage their business and operations. The company offers a suite of financial management applications to maintain accounting information in the general ledger; manage financial processes, such as payables and receivables; identify real-time financial, operational, and management insights; enhance financial consolidation; reduce time-to-close; promote internal control and auditability; and achieve consistency across finance operations.