Short Interest in Forestar Group Inc. (NYSE:FOR) Drops By 11.5%

Forestar Group Inc. (NYSE:FOR) was the target of a large decrease in short interest in October. As of October 31st, there was short interest totalling 344,200 shares, a decrease of 11.5% from the October 15th total of 389,000 shares. Currently, 1.8% of the company’s stock are short sold. Based on an average trading volume of 135,200 shares, the days-to-cover ratio is presently 2.5 days.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Separately, JPMorgan Chase & Co. dropped their price objective on Forestar Group from $37.50 to $36.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a report on Thursday, July 25th.

Insider Transactions at Forestar Group

In related news, Director G.F. (Rick) Ringler III sold 2,000 shares of Forestar Group stock in a transaction on Friday, September 27th. The shares were sold at an average price of $32.58, for a total transaction of $65,160.00. Following the sale, the director now directly owns 5,951 shares in the company, valued at $193,883.58. This trade represents a 25.15 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through the SEC website. Insiders own 0.49% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

A number of institutional investors and hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in FOR. Janney Montgomery Scott LLC acquired a new stake in Forestar Group in the first quarter valued at about $393,000. Sei Investments Co. raised its stake in shares of Forestar Group by 9.3% during the 1st quarter. Sei Investments Co. now owns 67,491 shares of the oil and gas exploration company’s stock worth $2,712,000 after buying an additional 5,731 shares in the last quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. lifted its holdings in shares of Forestar Group by 1.0% in the 1st quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 2,805,957 shares of the oil and gas exploration company’s stock valued at $112,771,000 after buying an additional 28,379 shares during the period. O Shaughnessy Asset Management LLC boosted its stake in shares of Forestar Group by 11.4% in the first quarter. O Shaughnessy Asset Management LLC now owns 98,337 shares of the oil and gas exploration company’s stock valued at $3,952,000 after buying an additional 10,031 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD boosted its stake in shares of Forestar Group by 7.6% in the first quarter. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD now owns 10,997 shares of the oil and gas exploration company’s stock valued at $442,000 after buying an additional 781 shares in the last quarter. 35.50% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Forestar Group Trading Down 0.2 %

NYSE:FOR opened at $29.34 on Tuesday. Forestar Group has a 12-month low of $27.49 and a 12-month high of $40.92. The company has a current ratio of 1.61, a quick ratio of 1.50 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.44. The stock’s 50 day simple moving average is $31.74 and its 200-day simple moving average is $31.80. The firm has a market cap of $1.49 billion, a P/E ratio of 7.32 and a beta of 1.76.

Forestar Group (NYSE:FOR) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, October 29th. The oil and gas exploration company reported $1.60 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.31 by $0.29. The company had revenue of $551.40 million for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $503.76 million. Forestar Group had a net margin of 13.48% and a return on equity of 13.59%. Forestar Group’s revenue was up .3% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the previous year, the company posted $1.44 EPS. Equities analysts anticipate that Forestar Group will post 3.67 EPS for the current year.

About Forestar Group

Forestar Group Inc operates as a residential lot development company in the United States. The company acquires land and develops infrastructure for single-family residential communities. It sells its residential single-family finished lots to local, regional, and national homebuilders. The company was incorporated in 2005 and is headquartered in Arlington, Texas.