Insider Selling: Guardant Health (NASDAQ:GH) CEO Sells $5,016,000.00 in Stock

Guardant Health, Inc. (NASDAQ:GH) CEO Amirali Talasaz sold 50,000 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, May 12th. The shares were sold at an average price of $100.32, for a total value of $5,016,000.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer owned 2,096,504 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $210,321,281.28. This trade represents a 2.33% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan.

Guardant Health Stock Down 3.8%

Shares of NASDAQ:GH opened at $94.92 on Friday. Guardant Health, Inc. has a 52-week low of $36.36 and a 52-week high of $120.74. The stock has a market cap of $12.59 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of -28.00 and a beta of 1.48. The business has a 50-day moving average price of $89.30 and a 200-day moving average price of $97.90.

Guardant Health (NASDAQ:GH) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, February 19th. The company reported ($0.50) earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of ($0.43) by ($0.07). The firm had revenue of $281.27 million during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $269.74 million. During the same period last year, the firm posted ($0.62) EPS. The firm’s revenue was up 39.4% on a year-over-year basis. As a group, equities analysts anticipate that Guardant Health, Inc. will post -2.87 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Institutional Trading of Guardant Health

Several hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently bought and sold shares of the stock. ABS Direct Equity Fund LLC acquired a new stake in Guardant Health during the first quarter worth about $210,000. Orbimed Advisors LLC acquired a new stake in Guardant Health during the first quarter worth about $40,199,000. Styrax Capital LP grew its holdings in Guardant Health by 6.5% during the first quarter. Styrax Capital LP now owns 300,000 shares of the company’s stock worth $27,711,000 after acquiring an additional 18,411 shares during the period. Waverly Advisors LLC acquired a new stake in Guardant Health during the first quarter worth about $269,000. Finally, Caxton Associates LLP acquired a new stake in Guardant Health in the first quarter valued at approximately $831,000. 92.60% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

GH has been the subject of several research analyst reports. Citigroup raised their price objective on Guardant Health from $135.00 to $150.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Friday, February 20th. Stifel Nicolaus raised their price objective on Guardant Health from $120.00 to $130.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Friday, February 20th. Wells Fargo & Company raised their price objective on Guardant Health from $120.00 to $125.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Friday, February 20th. Piper Sandler reaffirmed an “overweight” rating and set a $135.00 target price on shares of Guardant Health in a report on Tuesday. Finally, Barclays raised their target price on Guardant Health from $115.00 to $120.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a report on Friday, May 8th. Nineteen equities research analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating, one has issued a Hold rating and one has assigned a Sell rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, Guardant Health has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $129.42.

About Guardant Health

Guardant Health, Inc is a precision oncology company specializing in blood-based cancer diagnostics. Founded in 2012 and headquartered in Redwood City, California, the company develops non-invasive tests that use circulating tumor DNA (ctDNA) to profile genomic alterations in patients with solid tumors. Guardant Health’s mission is to advance cancer care by providing actionable data to clinicians, pharmaceutical partners and researchers worldwide.

The company’s flagship product, Guardant360, is a next-generation sequencing (NGS) assay designed to detect mutations, copy number variations and select fusions in more than 70 cancer-related genes.