Whitbread (LON:WTB) Trading Down 11.3% – Here’s What Happened

Whitbread plc (LON:WTB)’s stock price traded down 11.3% during mid-day trading on Friday . The company traded as low as GBX 2,490 and last traded at GBX 2,493.73. 2,620,126 shares changed hands during mid-day trading, an increase of 8% from the average session volume of 2,415,451 shares. The stock had previously closed at GBX 2,812.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several brokerages recently commented on WTB. Shore Capital reaffirmed a “buy” rating on shares of Whitbread in a report on Thursday, October 16th. Peel Hunt restated a “buy” rating and issued a GBX 3,500 price objective on shares of Whitbread in a research note on Thursday, October 16th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. boosted their target price on shares of Whitbread from GBX 2,800 to GBX 2,900 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research report on Friday, October 17th. Citigroup increased their price target on shares of Whitbread from GBX 3,600 to GBX 3,800 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Thursday, August 21st. Finally, Panmure Gordon restated a “buy” rating and issued a GBX 3,700 price target on shares of Whitbread in a research report on Tuesday. Five investment analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and one has assigned a Hold rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, Whitbread presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of GBX 3,480.

Whitbread Stock Down 11.3%

The stock has a market capitalization of £4.26 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 17.43, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of -3.09 and a beta of 1.11. The firm has a 50 day simple moving average of GBX 3,004.93 and a 200-day simple moving average of GBX 2,997.14. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 33.18, a current ratio of 0.96 and a quick ratio of 1.74.

Whitbread (LON:WTB) last issued its earnings results on Thursday, October 16th. The company reported GBX 133.70 EPS for the quarter. Whitbread had a net margin of 8.08% and a return on equity of 6.83%. On average, sell-side analysts forecast that Whitbread plc will post 227.1851852 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Insider Activity

In other news, insider Christine Mary Hodgson acquired 10,000 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, October 17th. The stock was bought at an average price of GBX 2,880 per share, with a total value of £288,000. Also, insider Richard Gillingwater bought 500 shares of Whitbread stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, October 21st. The stock was acquired at an average cost of GBX 2,974 per share, for a total transaction of £14,870. 0.38% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

About Whitbread

Whitbread is the owner of Premier Inn, the UK’s biggest
hotel brand, with 86,000 rooms in over 850 hotels
and a growing presence in Germany with 10,500 rooms in
59 hotels, offering quality accommodation at affordable
prices in great locations.

People are at the heart of our business. We employ over
38,000 team members in over 900 Premier Inn hotels
across the UK and Germany.