Novartis AG (NYSE:NVS) Receives $123.50 Average Price Target from Brokerages

Novartis AG (NYSE:NVS) has been assigned a consensus rating of “Hold” from the eleven research firms that are presently covering the stock, Marketbeat Ratings reports. Two investment analysts have rated the stock with a sell recommendation, seven have issued a hold recommendation, one has assigned a buy recommendation and one has assigned a strong buy recommendation to the company. The average twelve-month price objective among brokerages that have issued ratings on the stock in the last year is $123.50.

NVS has been the topic of a number of recent analyst reports. BNP Paribas raised Novartis to a “strong-buy” rating in a report on Tuesday, April 15th. Morgan Stanley raised Novartis from an “underweight” rating to an “equal weight” rating and set a $123.00 price target on the stock in a report on Friday, August 8th.

Novartis Trading Up 0.7%

Shares of NVS stock opened at $119.34 on Friday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.53, a quick ratio of 0.62 and a current ratio of 0.82. The stock has a fifty day simple moving average of $118.37 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $112.63. The firm has a market capitalization of $252.10 billion, a PE ratio of 17.37, a PEG ratio of 1.66 and a beta of 0.62. Novartis has a 52-week low of $96.06 and a 52-week high of $124.83.

Novartis (NYSE:NVS) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, July 17th. The company reported $2.42 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.38 by $0.04. The business had revenue of $14.05 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $13.94 billion. Novartis had a return on equity of 41.08% and a net margin of 25.64%. The business’s quarterly revenue was up 12.3% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period last year, the firm earned $1.97 earnings per share. On average, analysts predict that Novartis will post 8.45 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

A number of institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in NVS. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. grew its position in shares of Novartis by 60.3% during the first quarter. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. now owns 3,660,485 shares of the company’s stock valued at $408,071,000 after purchasing an additional 1,377,252 shares in the last quarter. New Vernon Capital Holdings II LLC grew its position in shares of Novartis by 12,664.1% during the first quarter. New Vernon Capital Holdings II LLC now owns 1,383,244 shares of the company’s stock valued at $154,204,000 after purchasing an additional 1,372,407 shares in the last quarter. Castlekeep Investment Advisors LLC purchased a new position in shares of Novartis during the fourth quarter valued at about $109,739,000. GAMMA Investing LLC grew its position in Novartis by 14,376.4% in the first quarter. GAMMA Investing LLC now owns 727,296 shares of the company’s stock worth $81,079,000 after acquiring an additional 722,272 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Bank of Montreal Can grew its position in Novartis by 489.1% in the second quarter. Bank of Montreal Can now owns 564,990 shares of the company’s stock worth $68,369,000 after acquiring an additional 469,080 shares in the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 13.12% of the company’s stock.

Novartis Company Profile

Novartis AG engages in the research, development, manufacture, and marketing of healthcare products in Switzerland and internationally. The company offers prescription medicines for patients and physicians. It focuses on therapeutic areas, such as cardiovascular, renal and metabolic, immunology, neuroscience, and oncology, as well as ophthalmology and hematology.