Short Interest in FirstCash Holdings, Inc. (NASDAQ:FCFS) Expands By 7.4%

FirstCash Holdings, Inc. (NASDAQ:FCFS) was the recipient of a large increase in short interest during the month of January. As of January 31st, there was short interest totalling 606,800 shares, an increase of 7.4% from the January 15th total of 564,800 shares. Based on an average daily volume of 232,800 shares, the short-interest ratio is currently 2.6 days. Approximately 1.6% of the shares of the company are short sold.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, CFO R Douglas Orr sold 2,000 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, February 5th. The shares were sold at an average price of $113.35, for a total value of $226,700.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief financial officer now directly owns 100,567 shares in the company, valued at $11,399,269.45. This trade represents a 1.95 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is accessible through this link. Also, major shareholder Douglas Richard Rippel sold 300,000 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, February 11th. The stock was sold at an average price of $113.43, for a total transaction of $34,029,000.00. Following the sale, the insider now owns 4,431,869 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $502,706,900.67. The trade was a 6.34 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. 14.77% of the stock is owned by insiders.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

A number of hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently modified their holdings of FCFS. FMR LLC raised its holdings in shares of FirstCash by 18.3% during the 3rd quarter. FMR LLC now owns 6,712,779 shares of the company’s stock valued at $770,627,000 after purchasing an additional 1,037,601 shares in the last quarter. Fiduciary Management Inc. WI raised its holdings in FirstCash by 76.1% in the 4th quarter. Fiduciary Management Inc. WI now owns 1,303,533 shares of the company’s stock worth $135,046,000 after acquiring an additional 563,265 shares during the period. Vaughan Nelson Investment Management L.P. bought a new position in FirstCash in the 3rd quarter worth $50,192,000. D. E. Shaw & Co. Inc. raised its holdings in FirstCash by 349.3% in the 4th quarter. D. E. Shaw & Co. Inc. now owns 294,281 shares of the company’s stock worth $30,488,000 after acquiring an additional 228,784 shares during the period. Finally, Tidal Investments LLC bought a new position in FirstCash in the 4th quarter worth $21,701,000. Institutional investors own 80.30% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

A number of brokerages recently weighed in on FCFS. TD Cowen reduced their target price on shares of FirstCash from $134.00 to $130.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a report on Monday, October 28th. Stephens started coverage on shares of FirstCash in a research report on Wednesday, November 13th. They issued an “overweight” rating and a $137.00 price target for the company.

FirstCash Stock Up 0.0 %

FCFS stock traded up $0.03 during midday trading on Tuesday, reaching $117.28. The company had a trading volume of 191,050 shares, compared to its average volume of 232,563. FirstCash has a 1 year low of $100.24 and a 1 year high of $133.64. The company has a current ratio of 4.14, a quick ratio of 3.15 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.84. The company has a market capitalization of $5.25 billion, a P/E ratio of 20.47 and a beta of 0.67. The company has a 50 day moving average of $109.09 and a two-hundred day moving average of $111.13.

FirstCash (NASDAQ:FCFS) last released its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, January 30th. The company reported $2.12 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.02 by $0.10. FirstCash had a net margin of 7.64% and a return on equity of 14.99%. On average, equities research analysts expect that FirstCash will post 7.7 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

FirstCash Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, February 28th. Stockholders of record on Friday, February 14th will be issued a dividend of $0.38 per share. The ex-dividend date is Friday, February 14th. This represents a $1.52 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 1.30%. FirstCash’s dividend payout ratio is currently 26.53%.

About FirstCash

FirstCash Holdings, Inc, together with its subsidiaries, operates retail pawn stores in the United States, Mexico, and rest of Latin America. The company operates in three segments: U.S. Pawn, Latin America Pawn, and Retail POS Payment Solutions segments. Its pawn stores lend money on the collateral of pledged personal property, including jewelry, electronics, tools, appliances, sporting goods, and musical instruments; and retails merchandise acquired through collateral forfeitures on forfeited pawn loans and over-the-counter purchases of merchandise directly from customers.