Viking Therapeutics (NASDAQ:VKTX) Releases Quarterly Earnings Results, Beats Expectations By $0.06 EPS

Viking Therapeutics (NASDAQ:VKTX) announced its earnings results on Wednesday. The biotechnology company reported ($0.20) EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of ($0.26) by $0.06, Briefing.com reports. During the same period in the previous year, the company earned ($0.19) EPS.

Viking Therapeutics Stock Up 28.3 %

Shares of VKTX traded up $14.27 during mid-day trading on Thursday, hitting $64.68. The stock had a trading volume of 20,605,708 shares, compared to its average volume of 4,819,043. The company has a market cap of $7.13 billion, a PE ratio of -69.55 and a beta of 1.03. The company’s fifty day simple moving average is $55.75 and its two-hundred day simple moving average is $55.89. Viking Therapeutics has a fifty-two week low of $8.28 and a fifty-two week high of $99.41.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several equities research analysts recently commented on VKTX shares. Morgan Stanley assumed coverage on Viking Therapeutics in a report on Thursday, June 27th. They set an “overweight” rating and a $105.00 target price on the stock. HC Wainwright restated a “buy” rating and set a $90.00 price objective on shares of Viking Therapeutics in a report on Thursday. Raymond James lifted their price objective on Viking Therapeutics from $116.00 to $118.00 and gave the stock a “strong-buy” rating in a report on Thursday. StockNews.com upgraded Viking Therapeutics to a “sell” rating in a report on Thursday, June 27th. Finally, Maxim Group restated a “buy” rating and set a $120.00 price objective on shares of Viking Therapeutics in a report on Tuesday, June 4th. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, nine have assigned a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat.com, the company currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $111.78.

Insider Transactions at Viking Therapeutics

In other news, CFO Greg Zante sold 66,756 shares of Viking Therapeutics stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, May 3rd. The stock was sold at an average price of $74.69, for a total value of $4,986,005.64. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief financial officer now owns 174,854 shares in the company, valued at approximately $13,059,845.26. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available through this hyperlink. In related news, CFO Greg Zante sold 66,756 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, May 3rd. The stock was sold at an average price of $74.69, for a total transaction of $4,986,005.64. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief financial officer now owns 174,854 shares in the company, valued at approximately $13,059,845.26. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at the SEC website. Also, COO Marianna Mancini sold 281,425 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, May 1st. The shares were sold at an average price of $78.66, for a total value of $22,136,890.50. Following the transaction, the chief operating officer now owns 348,508 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $27,413,639.28. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders own 4.70% of the company’s stock.

About Viking Therapeutics

Viking Therapeutics, Inc, a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company, focuses on the development of novel therapies for metabolic and endocrine disorders. The company's lead drug candidate is VK2809, an orally available tissue and receptor-subtype selective agonist of the thyroid hormone receptor beta (TRß), which is in Phase IIb clinical trials to treat patients with biopsy-confirmed non-alcoholic steatohepatitis, as well as NAFLD.