Stock Traders Purchase Large Volume of Marqeta Put Options (NASDAQ:MQ)

Marqeta, Inc. (NASDAQ:MQ) saw unusually large options trading activity on Friday. Stock investors bought 3,285 put options on the stock. This is an increase of approximately 62% compared to the average daily volume of 2,028 put options.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several research firms recently commented on MQ. Morgan Stanley reduced their price objective on Marqeta from $7.00 to $5.00 and set an “equal weight” rating for the company in a research note on Tuesday, November 5th. William Blair lowered shares of Marqeta from an “outperform” rating to a “market perform” rating in a research report on Tuesday, November 5th. Keefe, Bruyette & Woods lowered their target price on Marqeta from $6.00 to $5.00 and set a “market perform” rating on the stock in a report on Tuesday, November 5th. UBS Group cut their price target on Marqeta from $8.50 to $8.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a report on Friday, August 9th. Finally, Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft cut Marqeta from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating and dropped their target price for the company from $9.00 to $4.00 in a report on Tuesday, November 5th. Ten research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and six have given a buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, Marqeta presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $6.27.

Institutional Trading of Marqeta

A number of institutional investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in MQ. Congress Asset Management Co. raised its position in Marqeta by 46.8% during the third quarter. Congress Asset Management Co. now owns 1,055,681 shares of the company’s stock worth $5,194,000 after acquiring an additional 336,349 shares during the last quarter. Visa Foundation acquired a new position in shares of Marqeta in the second quarter worth $68,197,000. Vanguard Group Inc. lifted its position in shares of Marqeta by 3.6% in the first quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 47,435,778 shares of the company’s stock valued at $282,717,000 after acquiring an additional 1,642,621 shares in the last quarter. Westfield Capital Management Co. LP raised its stake in Marqeta by 27.6% in the 1st quarter. Westfield Capital Management Co. LP now owns 7,418,851 shares of the company’s stock valued at $44,216,000 after purchasing an additional 1,604,223 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Comerica Bank lifted its holdings in Marqeta by 27.8% in the 1st quarter. Comerica Bank now owns 1,007,954 shares of the company’s stock valued at $6,007,000 after purchasing an additional 219,001 shares in the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 78.64% of the company’s stock.

Marqeta Price Performance

Shares of MQ traded up $0.07 during mid-day trading on Friday, reaching $4.03. 4,089,616 shares of the company’s stock were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 5,278,987. Marqeta has a 52-week low of $3.37 and a 52-week high of $7.36. The business’s fifty day simple moving average is $4.93 and its 200-day simple moving average is $5.22. The stock has a market capitalization of $2.05 billion, a PE ratio of 198.00 and a beta of 1.73.

Marqeta (NASDAQ:MQ) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Monday, November 4th. The company reported ($0.06) earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of ($0.05) by ($0.01). The firm had revenue of $127.90 million during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $128.05 million. Marqeta had a net margin of 2.86% and a return on equity of 1.20%. The business’s quarterly revenue was up 20.8% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the prior year, the firm posted ($0.07) earnings per share. Equities research analysts predict that Marqeta will post 0.06 earnings per share for the current year.

Marqeta Company Profile

Marqeta, Inc operates a cloud-based open application programming interface platform that delivers card issuing and transaction processing services. It offers its solutions in various verticals, including financial services, on-demand services, expense management, and e-commerce enablement, as well as buy now, pay later.