AXT’s (AXTI) Buy Rating Reaffirmed at Needham & Company LLC

Needham & Company LLC reiterated their buy rating on shares of AXT (NASDAQ:AXTI) in a report published on Friday morning, Benzinga reports. They currently have a $5.00 price target on the semiconductor company’s stock.

Other equities research analysts have also issued research reports about the company. Craig Hallum lifted their price objective on AXT from $3.75 to $5.00 and gave the company a buy rating in a research note on Tuesday, April 9th. Wedbush reaffirmed an outperform rating and issued a $6.00 target price on shares of AXT in a research note on Monday, April 8th. B. Riley lifted their target price on shares of AXT from $3.80 to $5.50 and gave the company a buy rating in a research report on Friday, April 5th. Finally, StockNews.com lowered shares of AXT from a hold rating to a sell rating in a report on Saturday, March 2nd. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating and four have issued a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the company currently has a consensus rating of Moderate Buy and a consensus price target of $5.38.

AXT Trading Up 20.8 %

Shares of NASDAQ:AXTI traded up $0.63 during trading on Friday, hitting $3.66. 13,601,544 shares of the company were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 908,661. AXT has a 52-week low of $1.89 and a 52-week high of $5.64. The stock has a 50 day moving average of $4.03 and a 200 day moving average of $2.93.

AXT (NASDAQ:AXTI) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, May 2nd. The semiconductor company reported ($0.05) earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of ($0.08) by $0.03. The firm had revenue of $22.69 million for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $21.00 million. AXT had a negative return on equity of 7.36% and a negative net margin of 21.01%. During the same period in the prior year, the business posted ($0.08) earnings per share. As a group, analysts expect that AXT will post -0.1 EPS for the current year.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Several large investors have recently modified their holdings of AXTI. PNC Financial Services Group Inc. grew its position in AXT by 28.7% during the 4th quarter. PNC Financial Services Group Inc. now owns 11,200 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock worth $27,000 after acquiring an additional 2,500 shares during the last quarter. Byrne Asset Management LLC bought a new stake in AXT during the 1st quarter valued at $28,000. Quadrature Capital Ltd grew its holdings in AXT by 46.6% in the 4th quarter. Quadrature Capital Ltd now owns 37,387 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock worth $90,000 after acquiring an additional 11,892 shares during the last quarter. Brookstone Capital Management purchased a new position in shares of AXT in the fourth quarter valued at about $37,000. Finally, James Investment Research Inc. bought a new position in shares of AXT during the third quarter valued at about $38,000. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 49.52% of the company’s stock.

About AXT

AXT, Inc designs, develops, manufactures, and distributes compound and single element semiconductor substrates. The company offers indium phosphide for use in data center connectivity using light/lasers, high-speed data transfer in data centers, 5G communications, fiber optic lasers and detectors, consumer devices, passive optical networks, silicon photonics, photonic integrated circuits, thermo-photovoltaics, RF amplifier and switching, infrared light-emitting diode (LEDS) motion control, lidar for robotics and autonomous vehicles, and infrared thermal imaging.