Royce & Associates LP Sells 13,197 Shares of Alkermes plc (NASDAQ:ALKS)

Royce & Associates LP lowered its stake in Alkermes plc (NASDAQ:ALKS) by 19.5% during the 4th quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The firm owned 54,431 shares of the company’s stock after selling 13,197 shares during the quarter. Royce & Associates LP’s holdings in Alkermes were worth $1,565,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission.

A number of other large investors have also recently made changes to their positions in the stock. Loomis Sayles & Co. L P raised its stake in Alkermes by 365.5% during the 3rd quarter. Loomis Sayles & Co. L P now owns 1,882,936 shares of the company’s stock worth $52,704,000 after acquiring an additional 1,478,422 shares during the period. Frazier Life Sciences Management L.P. bought a new stake in shares of Alkermes during the 3rd quarter valued at $16,126,000. Raymond James Financial Inc. purchased a new position in shares of Alkermes during the 4th quarter valued at $12,293,000. C WorldWide Group Holding A S bought a new position in Alkermes in the 4th quarter worth $7,190,000. Finally, Barclays PLC increased its stake in Alkermes by 108.8% in the 3rd quarter. Barclays PLC now owns 423,931 shares of the company’s stock worth $11,867,000 after buying an additional 220,893 shares in the last quarter. 95.21% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

ALKS has been the topic of several research analyst reports. The Goldman Sachs Group boosted their price objective on Alkermes from $30.00 to $32.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Friday, February 14th. UBS Group upgraded Alkermes from a “sell” rating to a “neutral” rating and upped their price target for the stock from $21.00 to $38.00 in a research note on Tuesday, March 4th. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft began coverage on shares of Alkermes in a research report on Tuesday, February 11th. They set a “buy” rating and a $40.00 price objective on the stock. StockNews.com upgraded shares of Alkermes from a “buy” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Thursday, February 13th. Finally, Royal Bank of Canada started coverage on shares of Alkermes in a report on Thursday, March 13th. They issued a “sector perform” rating and a $40.00 price target on the stock. Four equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, nine have assigned a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $38.46.

Insider Activity

In related news, EVP Craig C. Hopkinson sold 100,918 shares of Alkermes stock in a transaction dated Thursday, January 30th. The shares were sold at an average price of $32.05, for a total transaction of $3,234,421.90. Following the completion of the transaction, the executive vice president now directly owns 44,290 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $1,419,494.50. The trade was a 69.50 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through the SEC website. Insiders own 4.89% of the company’s stock.

Alkermes Trading Down 1.2 %

ALKS opened at $33.92 on Friday. The stock has a 50-day moving average of $32.84 and a 200 day moving average of $30.00. Alkermes plc has a 12 month low of $22.90 and a 12 month high of $36.45. The firm has a market cap of $5.52 billion, a P/E ratio of 15.63, a P/E/G ratio of 2.20 and a beta of 0.62.

Alkermes (NASDAQ:ALKS) last released its earnings results on Wednesday, February 12th. The company reported $0.92 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.81 by $0.11. Alkermes had a return on equity of 30.80% and a net margin of 23.57%. On average, research analysts forecast that Alkermes plc will post 1.31 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Alkermes Profile

Alkermes plc, a biopharmaceutical company, researches, develops, and commercializes pharmaceutical products to address unmet medical needs of patients in therapeutic areas in the United States, Ireland, and internationally. It has a portfolio of proprietary commercial products for the treatment of alcohol dependence, opioid dependence, schizophrenia and bipolar I disorder and a pipeline of clinical and preclinical product candidates in development for neurological disorders.