Van ECK Associates Corp Cuts Stake in Altair Engineering Inc. (NASDAQ:ALTR)

Van ECK Associates Corp reduced its stake in shares of Altair Engineering Inc. (NASDAQ:ALTR) by 31.8% during the 4th quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The firm owned 926 shares of the software’s stock after selling 432 shares during the period. Van ECK Associates Corp’s holdings in Altair Engineering were worth $101,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Other institutional investors and hedge funds have also recently bought and sold shares of the company. Conestoga Capital Advisors LLC grew its position in shares of Altair Engineering by 1.4% during the third quarter. Conestoga Capital Advisors LLC now owns 2,522,551 shares of the software’s stock worth $240,929,000 after buying an additional 33,985 shares in the last quarter. State Street Corp raised its stake in shares of Altair Engineering by 3.3% during the third quarter. State Street Corp now owns 2,053,957 shares of the software’s stock valued at $196,173,000 after purchasing an additional 65,589 shares in the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC raised its stake in shares of Altair Engineering by 3.9% during the third quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 1,423,880 shares of the software’s stock valued at $136,020,000 after purchasing an additional 53,088 shares in the last quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. raised its stake in shares of Altair Engineering by 9.2% during the third quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. now owns 505,470 shares of the software’s stock valued at $48,277,000 after purchasing an additional 42,592 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Fisher Asset Management LLC grew its holdings in Altair Engineering by 27.0% during the third quarter. Fisher Asset Management LLC now owns 401,612 shares of the software’s stock worth $38,358,000 after acquiring an additional 85,303 shares during the period. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 63.38% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of research firms recently issued reports on ALTR. Rosenblatt Securities lifted their target price on Altair Engineering from $88.00 to $113.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a report on Thursday, October 31st. Needham & Company LLC reiterated a “hold” rating on shares of Altair Engineering in a report on Friday. Loop Capital reissued a “hold” rating and issued a $113.00 price target on shares of Altair Engineering in a research note on Thursday, October 31st. Royal Bank of Canada boosted their price target on Altair Engineering from $90.00 to $113.00 and gave the company a “sector perform” rating in a research note on Thursday, October 31st. Finally, Wolfe Research cut Altair Engineering from a “strong-buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Sunday, November 3rd. One analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating and seven have given a hold rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, the stock currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $100.83.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, CFO Matthew Charles Brown sold 1,048 shares of Altair Engineering stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, December 23rd. The stock was sold at an average price of $108.90, for a total transaction of $114,127.20. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief financial officer now directly owns 55,519 shares in the company, valued at approximately $6,046,019.10. The trade was a 1.85 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through this link. Also, major shareholder Jrs Investments Llc sold 6,500 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Friday, November 29th. The shares were sold at an average price of $105.69, for a total value of $686,985.00. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold 59,143 shares of company stock valued at $6,265,694 in the last 90 days. 21.75% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.

Altair Engineering Stock Performance

NASDAQ ALTR opened at $111.78 on Monday. The firm has a market cap of $9.51 billion, a P/E ratio of 657.53, a P/E/G ratio of 10.75 and a beta of 1.42. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.27, a current ratio of 3.27 and a quick ratio of 3.27. The stock’s 50-day moving average is $109.90 and its 200-day moving average is $101.65. Altair Engineering Inc. has a one year low of $75.71 and a one year high of $113.12.

Altair Engineering (NASDAQ:ALTR) last announced its earnings results on Thursday, February 20th. The software reported $0.36 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.51 by ($0.15). Altair Engineering had a net margin of 2.13% and a return on equity of 8.23%. The firm had revenue of $192.63 million during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $182.98 million. Sell-side analysts anticipate that Altair Engineering Inc. will post 0.87 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Altair Engineering Company Profile

Altair Engineering Inc, together with its subsidiaries, provides software and cloud solutions in the areas of simulation and design, high-performance computing, data analytics, and artificial intelligence in the United States and internationally. It operates in two segments, Software and Client Engineering Services.