Morgan Stanley Forecasts Strong Price Appreciation for BOX (NYSE:BOX) Stock

BOX (NYSE:BOX) had its price target lifted by investment analysts at Morgan Stanley from $35.00 to $38.00 in a report issued on Wednesday,Benzinga reports. The brokerage presently has an “equal weight” rating on the software maker’s stock. Morgan Stanley’s price objective points to a potential upside of 3.40% from the company’s current price.

A number of other equities analysts have also recently commented on BOX. Raymond James reissued an “outperform” rating and set a $38.00 target price (down previously from $40.00) on shares of BOX in a report on Wednesday, March 5th. Royal Bank of Canada lifted their price objective on BOX from $21.00 to $24.00 and gave the company an “underperform” rating in a report on Wednesday. JPMorgan Chase & Co. cut their price target on BOX from $38.00 to $37.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a report on Wednesday, March 5th. Wall Street Zen upgraded shares of BOX from a “buy” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research note on Wednesday, May 14th. Finally, UBS Group increased their price objective on shares of BOX from $37.00 to $40.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Wednesday. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, two have assigned a hold rating, eight have assigned a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $37.67.

BOX Trading Up 16.9%

BOX stock traded up $5.30 during trading hours on Wednesday, hitting $36.75. 8,772,684 shares of the stock traded hands, compared to its average volume of 1,860,147. The firm’s 50-day moving average price is $30.78 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $32.11. BOX has a one year low of $24.63 and a one year high of $37.21. The company has a market cap of $5.28 billion, a PE ratio of 45.87, a PEG ratio of 4.42 and a beta of 0.94.

BOX (NYSE:BOX) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, May 27th. The software maker reported $0.30 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.25 by $0.05. The company had revenue of $276.27 million during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $274.77 million. BOX had a negative return on equity of 17.20% and a net margin of 13.96%. The firm’s revenue was up 4.4% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the prior year, the company earned $0.39 earnings per share. On average, sell-side analysts expect that BOX will post 0.27 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

BOX declared that its Board of Directors has initiated a share buyback plan on Tuesday, March 4th that permits the company to buyback $150.00 million in shares. This buyback authorization permits the software maker to reacquire up to 3.1% of its stock through open market purchases. Stock buyback plans are typically an indication that the company’s board believes its shares are undervalued.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other BOX news, COO Olivia Nottebohm sold 1,332 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Monday, April 7th. The shares were sold at an average price of $29.01, for a total value of $38,641.32. Following the completion of the sale, the chief operating officer now directly owns 492,545 shares in the company, valued at approximately $14,288,730.45. This trade represents a 0.27% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. Also, CEO Aaron Levie sold 10,000 shares of BOX stock in a transaction dated Monday, March 10th. The shares were sold at an average price of $32.08, for a total transaction of $320,800.00. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer now owns 2,979,780 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $95,591,342.40. This represents a 0.33% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold 66,377 shares of company stock valued at $2,060,714 in the last three months. 3.90% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

Institutional Trading of BOX

Hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently modified their holdings of the business. Earnest Partners LLC grew its stake in BOX by 2.1% in the 4th quarter. Earnest Partners LLC now owns 7,896,931 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $249,543,000 after buying an additional 162,437 shares in the last quarter. RGM Capital LLC lifted its stake in shares of BOX by 9.3% in the 1st quarter. RGM Capital LLC now owns 3,749,773 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $115,718,000 after purchasing an additional 318,459 shares during the period. Arrowstreet Capital Limited Partnership raised its stake in BOX by 103.9% during the 4th quarter. Arrowstreet Capital Limited Partnership now owns 3,386,370 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $107,009,000 after acquiring an additional 1,725,197 shares during the period. Sei Investments Co. raised its stake in BOX by 8.4% during the 4th quarter. Sei Investments Co. now owns 3,286,619 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $103,857,000 after acquiring an additional 255,623 shares during the period. Finally, Dimensional Fund Advisors LP raised its stake in BOX by 0.4% during the 4th quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP now owns 2,610,450 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $82,492,000 after acquiring an additional 11,376 shares during the period. Institutional investors own 86.74% of the company’s stock.

About BOX

Box, Inc engages in the provision of an enterprise content platform that enables organizations to securely manage enterprise content while allowing easy, secure access and sharing of this content from anywhere, on any device. Its products include cloud content management, IT and admin controls, Box Governance, Box Zones, Box Relay, Box Shuttle, and Box KeySafe.