BrightView Holdings, Inc. (NYSE:BV) Short Interest Update

BrightView Holdings, Inc. (NYSE:BV) saw a large drop in short interest in the month of November. As of November 15th, there was short interest totalling 4,580,000 shares, a drop of 7.7% from the October 31st total of 4,960,000 shares. Approximately 7.7% of the company’s stock are sold short. Based on an average daily trading volume, of 517,100 shares, the short-interest ratio is presently 8.9 days.

Insider Activity

In other news, EVP Jonathan Mark Gottsegen sold 29,658 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, November 15th. The shares were sold at an average price of $16.06, for a total transaction of $476,307.48. Following the completion of the sale, the executive vice president now directly owns 100,354 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $1,611,685.24. The trade was a 22.81 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available at this link. 2.40% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On BrightView

A number of large investors have recently modified their holdings of BV. Barclays PLC increased its stake in BrightView by 133.6% in the 3rd quarter. Barclays PLC now owns 111,969 shares of the company’s stock worth $1,762,000 after acquiring an additional 64,035 shares during the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC increased its position in shares of BrightView by 18.2% in the third quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 1,337,545 shares of the company’s stock worth $21,057,000 after purchasing an additional 206,359 shares during the last quarter. Y Intercept Hong Kong Ltd purchased a new stake in BrightView in the third quarter valued at approximately $302,000. XTX Topco Ltd bought a new stake in BrightView during the third quarter valued at approximately $184,000. Finally, State Street Corp grew its stake in BrightView by 17.1% in the 3rd quarter. State Street Corp now owns 1,211,909 shares of the company’s stock worth $19,075,000 after buying an additional 177,105 shares in the last quarter. 92.41% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several equities analysts have weighed in on BV shares. Robert W. Baird raised their price objective on BrightView from $18.00 to $20.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note on Thursday, November 14th. BTIG Research initiated coverage on BrightView in a research report on Monday. They issued a “buy” rating and a $22.00 price objective on the stock. The Goldman Sachs Group boosted their price target on shares of BrightView from $11.30 to $12.90 and gave the stock a “sell” rating in a report on Friday, November 15th. Loop Capital boosted their target price on shares of BrightView from $18.00 to $20.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Friday, November 15th. Finally, Jefferies Financial Group raised shares of BrightView from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating and lifted their price target for the stock from $13.00 to $17.00 in a report on Wednesday, August 21st. Two investment analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, one has assigned a hold rating, six have assigned a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, the company presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $17.11.

BrightView Stock Performance

BV stock traded up $0.23 during midday trading on Monday, reaching $17.33. 551,411 shares of the company’s stock traded hands, compared to its average volume of 618,175. BrightView has a 52 week low of $7.74 and a 52 week high of $18.89. The company has a 50-day moving average price of $16.51 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $15.00. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.63, a quick ratio of 1.44 and a current ratio of 1.44. The firm has a market capitalization of $1.65 billion, a PE ratio of 159.55 and a beta of 1.28.

BrightView (NYSE:BV) last released its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, November 13th. The company reported $0.30 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.28 by $0.02. BrightView had a return on equity of 7.65% and a net margin of 2.40%. The company had revenue of $728.70 million for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $723.01 million. During the same period in the previous year, the company posted $0.14 EPS. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was down 2.0% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, equities analysts anticipate that BrightView will post 0.75 EPS for the current year.

About BrightView

BrightView Holdings, Inc, through its subsidiaries, provides commercial landscaping services in the United States. It operates through two segments, Maintenance Services and Development Services. The Maintenance Services segment delivers a suite of recurring commercial landscaping services, including mowing, gardening, mulching and snow removal, water management, irrigation maintenance, tree care, golf course maintenance, and specialty turf maintenance.