Virtu Financial LLC Raises Holdings in BlackBerry Limited (NYSE:BB)

Virtu Financial LLC lifted its stake in BlackBerry Limited (NYSE:BB) by 117.3% during the fourth quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The fund owned 309,583 shares of the company’s stock after buying an additional 167,145 shares during the quarter. Virtu Financial LLC’s holdings in BlackBerry were worth $1,170,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

A number of other hedge funds have also recently modified their holdings of the stock. Barclays PLC raised its holdings in BlackBerry by 60.2% in the 3rd quarter. Barclays PLC now owns 249,218 shares of the company’s stock worth $652,000 after purchasing an additional 93,651 shares during the period. Milestone Asset Management LLC acquired a new position in BlackBerry in the 4th quarter worth about $557,000. Capstone Investment Advisors LLC acquired a new position in BlackBerry in the 3rd quarter worth about $1,285,000. Connor Clark & Lunn Investment Management Ltd. raised its holdings in BlackBerry by 41.9% in the 4th quarter. Connor Clark & Lunn Investment Management Ltd. now owns 13,669,715 shares of the company’s stock worth $51,856,000 after purchasing an additional 4,039,483 shares during the period. Finally, Alberta Investment Management Corp raised its holdings in BlackBerry by 60.5% in the 4th quarter. Alberta Investment Management Corp now owns 644,900 shares of the company’s stock worth $2,448,000 after purchasing an additional 243,000 shares during the period. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 54.48% of the company’s stock.

Insider Buying and Selling

In related news, CEO John Joseph Giamatteo sold 155,815 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, January 2nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $3.68, for a total value of $573,399.20. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer now directly owns 385,552 shares in the company, valued at approximately $1,418,831.36. This represents a 28.78 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is accessible through this link. Also, CAO Jay P. Chai sold 24,425 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Friday, January 24th. The stock was sold at an average price of $4.19, for a total value of $102,340.75. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last three months, insiders sold 244,221 shares of company stock worth $925,655. Company insiders own 0.34% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of equities analysts recently weighed in on BB shares. TD Cowen raised BlackBerry from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating and upped their price target for the stock from $3.25 to $4.00 in a report on Friday, December 20th. StockNews.com raised BlackBerry from a “sell” rating to a “hold” rating in a report on Monday, December 9th. Canaccord Genuity Group increased their target price on BlackBerry from $3.00 to $4.75 and gave the company a “hold” rating in a report on Tuesday, March 11th. Royal Bank of Canada increased their target price on BlackBerry from $3.25 to $4.00 and gave the company a “sector perform” rating in a report on Friday, January 10th. Finally, TD Securities raised BlackBerry from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating and increased their target price for the company from $3.25 to $4.00 in a report on Friday, December 20th. Six equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, three have issued a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat, BlackBerry currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $3.91.

BlackBerry Price Performance

BB stock opened at $4.33 on Monday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.27, a current ratio of 1.37 and a quick ratio of 1.37. The business has a 50 day simple moving average of $4.69 and a 200-day simple moving average of $3.42. The firm has a market capitalization of $2.58 billion, a PE ratio of -19.66 and a beta of 1.27. BlackBerry Limited has a 1 year low of $2.01 and a 1 year high of $6.24.

BlackBerry (NYSE:BB) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, December 19th. The company reported $0.02 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of ($0.01) by $0.03. The business had revenue of $143.00 million during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $144.84 million. BlackBerry had a negative return on equity of 2.02% and a negative net margin of 21.16%. The business’s revenue was down 5.9% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the prior year, the business earned $0.01 earnings per share. Equities research analysts anticipate that BlackBerry Limited will post -0.03 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

About BlackBerry

BlackBerry Limited provides intelligent security software and services to enterprises and governments worldwide. The company operates through three segments: Cybersecurity, IoT, and Licensing and Other. The company offers CylanceENDPOINT, an integrated endpoint security solution; CylanceGUARD, a managed detection and response solution; CylanceEDGE, an AI-powered continuous authentication zero trust network access solution; CylanceINTELLIGENCE, a contextual cyber threat intelligence service; BlackBerry Dynamics offers a development platform and secure container for mobile applications; BlackBerry Workspaces a secure Enterprise File Sync and Share (EFSS) solution; BlackBerry Messenger (BBM) Enterprise, an enterprise-grade secure instant messaging solution for messaging, voice and video; BlackBerry SecuSUITE is a certified, multi-OS voice and text messaging solution; BlackBerry AtHoc, a secure networked critical event management solution; and BlackBerry unified endpoint management (UEM) solutions.