DnB Asset Management AS Boosts Stake in VeriSign, Inc. (NASDAQ:VRSN)

DnB Asset Management AS raised its position in shares of VeriSign, Inc. (NASDAQ:VRSN) by 1.5% in the 4th quarter, according to its most recent 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The institutional investor owned 15,210 shares of the information services provider’s stock after buying an additional 229 shares during the quarter. DnB Asset Management AS’s holdings in VeriSign were worth $3,148,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Other large investors have also added to or reduced their stakes in the company. denkapparat Operations GmbH purchased a new position in shares of VeriSign in the fourth quarter valued at $239,000. Orion Portfolio Solutions LLC lifted its position in VeriSign by 4.0% during the fourth quarter. Orion Portfolio Solutions LLC now owns 9,746 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $2,017,000 after purchasing an additional 377 shares during the last quarter. Nomura Asset Management Co. Ltd. grew its stake in shares of VeriSign by 0.5% in the 4th quarter. Nomura Asset Management Co. Ltd. now owns 45,290 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $9,373,000 after buying an additional 242 shares in the last quarter. New Age Alpha Advisors LLC increased its holdings in shares of VeriSign by 17,553.1% in the 4th quarter. New Age Alpha Advisors LLC now owns 25,244 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $5,224,000 after buying an additional 25,101 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Norges Bank purchased a new stake in shares of VeriSign during the 4th quarter valued at about $222,840,000. Institutional investors own 92.90% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

VRSN has been the topic of several analyst reports. Robert W. Baird raised VeriSign from a “neutral” rating to an “outperform” rating and boosted their price objective for the stock from $200.00 to $250.00 in a research note on Monday, December 9th. Baird R W upgraded VeriSign from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a report on Monday, December 9th. StockNews.com downgraded VeriSign from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Friday, March 21st. Finally, Citigroup boosted their price objective on shares of VeriSign from $246.00 to $250.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Tuesday, February 4th.

Insider Buying and Selling at VeriSign

In other news, SVP John Calys sold 447 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, February 24th. The shares were sold at an average price of $231.75, for a total transaction of $103,592.25. Following the transaction, the senior vice president now directly owns 23,735 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $5,500,586.25. This trade represents a 1.85 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through this link. 0.84% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

VeriSign Stock Performance

Shares of NASDAQ VRSN opened at $253.87 on Tuesday. VeriSign, Inc. has a fifty-two week low of $167.05 and a fifty-two week high of $257.14. The company has a market cap of $24.02 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 31.73 and a beta of 0.87. The business’s 50 day moving average price is $231.27 and its 200-day moving average price is $205.23.

VeriSign (NASDAQ:VRSN) last released its earnings results on Thursday, February 6th. The information services provider reported $2.00 earnings per share for the quarter, hitting the consensus estimate of $2.00. VeriSign had a negative return on equity of 43.01% and a net margin of 50.47%.

VeriSign Profile

VeriSign, Inc, together with its subsidiaries, provides domain name registry services and internet infrastructure that enables internet navigation for various recognized domain names worldwide. The company enables the security, stability, and resiliency of internet infrastructure and services, including providing root zone maintainer services, operating two of thirteen internet root servers; and offering registration services and authoritative resolution for the .com and .net domains, which supports global e-commerce.