Nova’s (NVMI) Hold Rating Reaffirmed at Needham & Company LLC

Nova (NASDAQ:NVMI)‘s stock had its “hold” rating restated by stock analysts at Needham & Company LLC in a research note issued on Friday,Benzinga reports.

NVMI has been the subject of several other reports. Benchmark boosted their price objective on shares of Nova from $215.00 to $240.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Friday, August 9th. Citigroup cut Nova from a “buy” rating to a “neutral” rating and reduced their price objective for the company from $273.00 to $224.00 in a research note on Monday, September 16th. Two analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and four have assigned a buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $227.80.

Nova Stock Down 4.2 %

Shares of NASDAQ:NVMI traded down $8.69 during trading on Friday, reaching $197.68. 336,274 shares of the company traded hands, compared to its average volume of 227,274. The firm has a market capitalization of $5.74 billion, a PE ratio of 41.10, a PEG ratio of 1.98 and a beta of 1.47. Nova has a 52 week low of $102.23 and a 52 week high of $247.21. The company’s 50 day moving average is $198.31 and its two-hundred day moving average is $208.12.

Nova (NASDAQ:NVMI) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, August 8th. The semiconductor company reported $1.61 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.18 by $0.43. The firm had revenue of $156.86 million for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $148.12 million. Nova had a net margin of 27.38% and a return on equity of 20.76%. The business’s revenue for the quarter was up 27.8% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the prior year, the company posted $0.97 earnings per share. As a group, research analysts anticipate that Nova will post 5.63 EPS for the current year.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Nova

A number of institutional investors and hedge funds have recently added to or reduced their stakes in NVMI. BNP Paribas Financial Markets raised its holdings in shares of Nova by 231.2% in the first quarter. BNP Paribas Financial Markets now owns 31,083 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock worth $5,514,000 after buying an additional 21,699 shares during the last quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. lifted its holdings in shares of Nova by 1.5% during the first quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 987,071 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock worth $175,087,000 after purchasing an additional 14,115 shares during the period. Tidal Investments LLC purchased a new stake in Nova in the first quarter valued at approximately $2,589,000. Sei Investments Co. increased its holdings in Nova by 12.7% in the 1st quarter. Sei Investments Co. now owns 128,423 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock worth $22,780,000 after buying an additional 14,508 shares during the period. Finally, Westfield Capital Management Co. LP purchased a new position in Nova during the 1st quarter worth approximately $38,661,000. Institutional investors own 82.99% of the company’s stock.

About Nova

Nova Ltd. designs, develops, produces, and sells process control systems used in the manufacture of semiconductors in Israel, Taiwan, the United States, China, Korea, and internationally. Its product portfolio includes a set of metrology platforms for dimensional, films, and materials and chemical metrology measurements for process control for various semiconductor manufacturing process steps, including lithography, etch, chemical mechanical planarization, deposition, electrochemical plating, and advanced packaging.