Baillie Gifford & Co. Grows Stock Holdings in Veeco Instruments Inc. (NASDAQ:VECO)

Baillie Gifford & Co. raised its holdings in shares of Veeco Instruments Inc. (NASDAQ:VECO) by 32.2% during the third quarter, HoldingsChannel reports. The fund owned 631,011 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock after purchasing an additional 153,754 shares during the quarter. Baillie Gifford & Co.’s holdings in Veeco Instruments were worth $20,905,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).

Several other institutional investors have also recently made changes to their positions in VECO. Vanguard Group Inc. grew its position in shares of Veeco Instruments by 5.8% in the first quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 7,131,073 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock valued at $250,800,000 after purchasing an additional 391,346 shares in the last quarter. Driehaus Capital Management LLC boosted its stake in Veeco Instruments by 119.3% in the 2nd quarter. Driehaus Capital Management LLC now owns 1,458,288 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock worth $68,117,000 after purchasing an additional 793,429 shares during the period. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. grew its holdings in Veeco Instruments by 5.6% during the 2nd quarter. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. now owns 598,014 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock valued at $27,933,000 after buying an additional 31,482 shares in the last quarter. New York State Common Retirement Fund increased its position in shares of Veeco Instruments by 249.0% during the third quarter. New York State Common Retirement Fund now owns 430,757 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock valued at $14,271,000 after buying an additional 307,348 shares during the period. Finally, Silvercrest Asset Management Group LLC lifted its holdings in shares of Veeco Instruments by 4.5% in the first quarter. Silvercrest Asset Management Group LLC now owns 384,310 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock worth $13,516,000 after buying an additional 16,557 shares in the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 98.46% of the company’s stock.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other Veeco Instruments news, CFO John P. Kiernan sold 2,500 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, November 11th. The shares were sold at an average price of $28.67, for a total transaction of $71,675.00. Following the transaction, the chief financial officer now directly owns 80,142 shares in the company, valued at $2,297,671.14. This trade represents a 0.00 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this hyperlink. Insiders sold 7,500 shares of company stock worth $225,850 in the last quarter. 2.20% of the stock is owned by insiders.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

Several equities analysts recently commented on VECO shares. Benchmark reduced their price objective on shares of Veeco Instruments from $42.00 to $38.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research note on Thursday, November 7th. StockNews.com upgraded shares of Veeco Instruments from a “sell” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Monday. Needham & Company LLC reaffirmed a “buy” rating and issued a $55.00 price target on shares of Veeco Instruments in a report on Wednesday, August 7th. Oppenheimer dropped their price objective on Veeco Instruments from $45.00 to $40.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a research note on Thursday, November 7th. Finally, The Goldman Sachs Group reduced their target price on Veeco Instruments from $35.00 to $30.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a research report on Thursday, November 7th. Four investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and four have assigned a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $42.14.

Veeco Instruments Stock Performance

Veeco Instruments stock opened at $27.97 on Wednesday. Veeco Instruments Inc. has a fifty-two week low of $27.06 and a fifty-two week high of $49.25. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.33, a quick ratio of 2.41 and a current ratio of 3.54. The stock has a market cap of $1.59 billion, a P/E ratio of 20.72 and a beta of 1.17. The firm’s fifty day moving average price is $30.84 and its 200-day moving average price is $37.38.

Veeco Instruments (NASDAQ:VECO) last released its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, November 6th. The semiconductor company reported $0.46 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.45 by $0.01. Veeco Instruments had a return on equity of 10.92% and a net margin of 11.34%. The business had revenue of $184.80 million for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $180.57 million. During the same quarter last year, the business posted $0.41 earnings per share. The company’s revenue for the quarter was up 4.2% on a year-over-year basis. On average, equities research analysts expect that Veeco Instruments Inc. will post 1.2 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

About Veeco Instruments

Veeco Instruments Inc, together with its subsidiaries, develops, manufactures, sells, and supports semiconductor and thin film process equipment primarily to make electronic devices in the United States, Europe, the Middle East, and Africa, China, Rest of the Asia-Pacific, and internationally. The company offers laser annealing, ion beam deposition and etch, metal organic chemical vapor deposition, single wafer wet processing and surface preparation, molecular beam epitaxy, advanced packaging lithography, atomic layer deposition, and other deposition systems.