Edwards Lifesciences Co. (NYSE:EW) Short Interest Down 14.5% in October

Edwards Lifesciences Co. (NYSE:EW) was the target of a significant decrease in short interest during the month of October. As of October 15th, there was short interest totalling 8,220,000 shares, a decrease of 14.5% from the September 30th total of 9,610,000 shares. Based on an average daily volume of 7,090,000 shares, the days-to-cover ratio is currently 1.2 days. Approximately 1.4% of the company’s shares are short sold.

Insider Activity at Edwards Lifesciences

In related news, VP Donald E. Bobo, Jr. sold 5,000 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, August 14th. The shares were sold at an average price of $66.08, for a total value of $330,400.00. Following the sale, the vice president now directly owns 46,936 shares in the company, valued at $3,101,530.88. This trade represents a 0.00 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available at this link. In other news, VP Donald E. Bobo, Jr. sold 5,000 shares of the stock in a transaction on Wednesday, August 14th. The shares were sold at an average price of $66.08, for a total transaction of $330,400.00. Following the completion of the sale, the vice president now owns 46,936 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $3,101,530.88. This represents a 0.00 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this hyperlink. Also, VP Daveen Chopra sold 1,250 shares of Edwards Lifesciences stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, August 20th. The shares were sold at an average price of $69.95, for a total value of $87,437.50. Following the completion of the sale, the vice president now directly owns 29,333 shares in the company, valued at $2,051,843.35. This represents a 0.00 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last quarter, insiders sold 16,250 shares of company stock worth $1,099,238. 1.29% of the stock is owned by insiders.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On Edwards Lifesciences

Hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently bought and sold shares of the company. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD grew its position in shares of Edwards Lifesciences by 57.9% during the 1st quarter. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD now owns 6,516,260 shares of the medical research company’s stock worth $622,695,000 after buying an additional 2,390,137 shares during the period. CCLA Investment Management grew its stake in shares of Edwards Lifesciences by 100,739.7% in the 1st quarter. CCLA Investment Management now owns 1,406,714 shares of the medical research company’s stock valued at $134,092,000 after buying an additional 1,405,319 shares during the period. Swedbank AB acquired a new position in Edwards Lifesciences during the 1st quarter worth approximately $124,511,000. Sei Investments Co. raised its stake in Edwards Lifesciences by 162.7% during the 1st quarter. Sei Investments Co. now owns 1,465,719 shares of the medical research company’s stock worth $140,064,000 after buying an additional 907,688 shares during the period. Finally, Bank of New York Mellon Corp grew its stake in Edwards Lifesciences by 4.3% in the second quarter. Bank of New York Mellon Corp now owns 19,782,909 shares of the medical research company’s stock valued at $1,827,347,000 after acquiring an additional 809,605 shares during the period. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 79.46% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

EW has been the topic of several recent analyst reports. Royal Bank of Canada lowered their price target on Edwards Lifesciences from $85.00 to $75.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a research report on Tuesday, October 8th. Robert W. Baird lowered their target price on shares of Edwards Lifesciences from $73.00 to $68.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a report on Friday, October 25th. StockNews.com cut shares of Edwards Lifesciences from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Thursday, July 25th. Barclays lowered their price objective on shares of Edwards Lifesciences from $90.00 to $80.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a research note on Monday, September 9th. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. upped their target price on shares of Edwards Lifesciences from $72.00 to $78.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a report on Friday, October 25th. Sixteen equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, ten have given a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $75.67.

Edwards Lifesciences Trading Down 2.3 %

Shares of NYSE:EW traded down $1.61 during midday trading on Thursday, hitting $67.02. 6,306,014 shares of the stock were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 4,648,499. The business’s 50-day moving average price is $67.98 and its 200 day moving average price is $77.85. Edwards Lifesciences has a 12 month low of $58.93 and a 12 month high of $96.12. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.08, a quick ratio of 2.87 and a current ratio of 3.71. The stock has a market capitalization of $40.39 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 28.89, a P/E/G ratio of 3.00 and a beta of 1.13.

Edwards Lifesciences (NYSE:EW) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, October 24th. The medical research company reported $0.67 earnings per share for the quarter, hitting the consensus estimate of $0.67. The company had revenue of $1.35 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $1.57 billion. Edwards Lifesciences had a net margin of 24.55% and a return on equity of 22.35%. Edwards Lifesciences’s revenue for the quarter was up 8.9% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm posted $0.59 earnings per share. Analysts predict that Edwards Lifesciences will post 2.61 earnings per share for the current year.

Edwards Lifesciences Company Profile

Edwards Lifesciences Corporation provides products and technologies for structural heart disease and critical care monitoring in the United States, Europe, Japan, and internationally. It offers transcatheter heart valve replacement products for the minimally invasive replacement of aortic heart valves under the Edwards SAPIEN family of valves system; and transcatheter heart valve repair and replacement products to treat mitral and tricuspid valve diseases under the PASCAL PRECISION and Cardioband names.