Is It Right Time to Be Bearish on Microsoft Corporation (MSFT), Centene Corporation (CNC)? - Financial Mercury

The shares of Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT) has been pegged with a rating of Buy by BofA/Merrill in its latest research note that was published on April 25th, 2019. The research company has also assigned a $155 price target. BofA/Merrill wasn’t the only research firm that published a report of Microsoft Corporation, with other equities research analysts also giving their opinion on the stock. BMO Capital Markets advised investors in its research note published on April 25th, 2019, to Outperform the MSFT stock while also putting a $147 price target. The stock had earned Buy rating from Mizuho when it published its report on March 14th, 2019. The stock was given Buy rating by Nomura in its report released on January 31st, 2019, the day when the price target on the stock was placed at $113. Citigroup was of a view that MSFT is Neutral in its latest report on January 31st, 2019 while giving it a price target of $110. BofA/Merrill thinks that MSFT is worth Buy rating. This was contained in the firm’s report on October 25th, 2018 in which the stock’s price target was also moved to $140.

Amongst the analysts that rated the stock, 1 have recommended investors to sell it, 2 believe it has the potential for further growth, thus rating it as Hold while 18 advised investors to purchase the stock. The consensus currently stands at a Hold while its average price target is $143.16. The price of the stock the last time has raised by 34.12% from its Week high price while it is raised higher than its 52-Week low price. A look at the stock’s other technical shows that its 14-day RSI now stands at 54.00.

The shares of the company added by 1.03% during the trading session on Wednesday, reaching a low of $123.70 while ending the day at $126.02. During the trading session, a total of 24.52 million shares were traded which represents a 2.01% incline from the average session volume which is 25.02M shares. MSFT had ended its last session trading at 124.73. Microsoft Corporation currently has a market cap of $953.29B, while its P/E ratio stands at 28.10, while its P/E earnings growth sits at 7.80, with a beta of 1.25. Microsoft Corporation debt-to-equity ratio currently stands at 0.83, while its quick ratio hovers at 2.90. MSFT 52-week low price stands at $93.96 while its 52-week high price is $131.37.

The company in its last quarterly report recorded $1.14 earnings per share which is above the $1.00 predicted by most analysts. The Microsoft Corporation generated $30,571.00 million in revenue during the last quarter, which is slightly higher than the $29,839.00 million predicted by analysts. In the second quarter last year, the firm recorded $1.10 earnings per share. Compared to the same quarter last year, the firm’s revenue was up by 3.51%. Microsoft Corporation has the potential to record 4.49 EPS for the current fiscal year, according to equities analysts.

Investment analysts at Citigroup published a research note on May 10th, 2019 where it informed investors and clients that Centene Corporation (NYSE:CNC) is now rated as Buy. Their price target on the stock stands at $69. BMO Capital Markets also rated CNC as Reiterated on April 25th, 2019, with its price target of suggesting that CNC could surge by 26.51% from its current share price. Even though the stock has been trading at $54.74/share, analysts expect it to surge higher by -0.57% to reach $74.06/share. It started the day trading at $55.30 and traded between $54.05 and $54.43 throughout the trading session.

A look at its technical shows that CNC’s 50-day SMA is 54.57 while its 200-day SMA stands at 63.72. The stock has a high of $74.49 for the year while the low is $45.44. The company’s P/E ratio currently sits at 20.82, while the P/B ratio is 1.95. At the moment, only of Centene Corporation shares were sold short. The company’s average trading volume currently stands at 7.70M shares, which means that the short-interest ratio is just 2.58 days. Over the past seven days, the company moved, with its shift of -3.87%. Looking further, the stock has dropped -14.54% over the past 90 days while it lost -23.51% over the last six months.

The change in the stock’s fortunes has led to several institutional investors altering their holdings of the stock. The Vanguard Group Inc bought more CNC shares, increasing its portfolio by +1.99% during the last quarter. This move now sees The Vanguard Group Inc purchasing 797,960 shares in the last quarter, thus it now holds 40,953,096 shares of CNC, with a total valuation of $2,111,541,630. T Rowe Price Associates Inc meanwhile sold more CNC shares in the recently filed quarter, changing its stake to $1,721,007,938 worth of shares. Capital Research Management Co followed the path by increasing its CNC portfolio by +18.63% in the quarter. This means that Capital Research Management Co bought 3,791,154 shares in the last quarter and now controls 24,138,780 shares of the CNC stock, with the valuation hitting $1,244,595,497.

Similarly, SSgA Funds Management Inc increased its Centene Corporation shares by +1.30% during the recently filed quarter. After buying 214,714 shares in the last quarter, the firm now controls 16,676,638 shares of Centene Corporation which are valued at $859,847,455. In the same vein, Capital Research Management Co decreased its Centene Corporation shares by during the most recent reported quarter. The firm sold -557,852 shares during the quarter which decreased its stakes to 13,433,654 shares and is now valued at $692,639,200. Following these latest developments, around 4.90% of Centene Corporation stocks are owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

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