NVIDIA (NASDAQ:NVDA) Shares Up 4.3% – Still a Buy?

NVIDIA Co. (NASDAQ:NVDA)’s share price rose 4.3% during mid-day trading on Wednesday . The stock traded as high as $136.20 and last traded at $135.99. Approximately 74,412,961 shares changed hands during trading, a decline of 81% from the average daily volume of 383,089,031 shares. The stock had previously closed at $130.39.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of brokerages have issued reports on NVDA. Citigroup lifted their price objective on NVIDIA from $170.00 to $175.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Thursday, November 21st. Barclays boosted their price target on shares of NVIDIA from $145.00 to $160.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research report on Thursday, November 21st. JPMorgan Chase & Co. raised their price objective on shares of NVIDIA from $155.00 to $170.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a report on Thursday, November 21st. TD Cowen boosted their target price on NVIDIA from $165.00 to $175.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Thursday, November 21st. Finally, Susquehanna raised their price target on NVIDIA from $160.00 to $180.00 and gave the company a “positive” rating in a report on Thursday, November 14th. Four equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, thirty-nine have assigned a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $164.15.

NVIDIA Stock Performance

The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.13, a current ratio of 4.10 and a quick ratio of 3.64. The stock has a 50-day moving average price of $139.63 and a 200 day moving average price of $127.11. The company has a market cap of $3.20 trillion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 51.43, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.43 and a beta of 1.63.

NVIDIA (NASDAQ:NVDA) last announced its earnings results on Wednesday, November 20th. The computer hardware maker reported $0.81 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.69 by $0.12. The firm had revenue of $35.08 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $33.15 billion. NVIDIA had a net margin of 55.69% and a return on equity of 114.83%. The business’s quarterly revenue was up 93.6% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period last year, the company posted $0.38 EPS. As a group, analysts anticipate that NVIDIA Co. will post 2.78 EPS for the current fiscal year.

NVIDIA Announces Dividend

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, December 27th. Investors of record on Thursday, December 5th will be paid a $0.01 dividend. This represents a $0.04 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 0.03%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, December 5th. NVIDIA’s payout ratio is presently 1.57%.

NVIDIA declared that its board has initiated a share buyback program on Wednesday, August 28th that permits the company to buyback $50.00 billion in shares. This buyback authorization permits the computer hardware maker to repurchase up to 1.6% of its stock through open market purchases. Stock buyback programs are typically an indication that the company’s board believes its shares are undervalued.

Insider Activity at NVIDIA

In other news, Director Mark A. Stevens sold 165,100 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, September 24th. The shares were sold at an average price of $121.27, for a total transaction of $20,021,677.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the director now directly owns 8,420,117 shares in the company, valued at $1,021,107,588.59. This represents a 1.92 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available at the SEC website. Also, Director Tench Coxe sold 1,000,000 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, December 16th. The shares were sold at an average price of $131.26, for a total value of $131,260,000.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the director now owns 28,671,360 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $3,763,402,713.60. The trade was a 3.37 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last quarter, insiders have sold 1,556,986 shares of company stock valued at $201,687,727. 4.23% of the stock is owned by insiders.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On NVIDIA

Several large investors have recently made changes to their positions in the stock. University of Texas Texas AM Investment Management Co. increased its stake in shares of NVIDIA by 897.5% during the 2nd quarter. University of Texas Texas AM Investment Management Co. now owns 119,110 shares of the computer hardware maker’s stock worth $14,715,000 after purchasing an additional 107,169 shares during the last quarter. Truepoint Inc. grew its holdings in NVIDIA by 914.1% during the second quarter. Truepoint Inc. now owns 12,990 shares of the computer hardware maker’s stock worth $1,605,000 after purchasing an additional 11,709 shares during the period. Westwood Holdings Group Inc. increased its position in NVIDIA by 683.9% during the second quarter. Westwood Holdings Group Inc. now owns 238,829 shares of the computer hardware maker’s stock worth $29,505,000 after buying an additional 208,362 shares during the last quarter. Blue Square Asset Management LLC raised its stake in NVIDIA by 26.7% in the third quarter. Blue Square Asset Management LLC now owns 48,093 shares of the computer hardware maker’s stock valued at $5,840,000 after buying an additional 10,136 shares during the period. Finally, Narwhal Capital Management lifted its position in shares of NVIDIA by 5.1% in the third quarter. Narwhal Capital Management now owns 545,676 shares of the computer hardware maker’s stock valued at $66,267,000 after buying an additional 26,373 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 65.27% of the company’s stock.

About NVIDIA

NVIDIA Corporation provides graphics and compute and networking solutions in the United States, Taiwan, China, Hong Kong, and internationally. The Graphics segment offers GeForce GPUs for gaming and PCs, the GeForce NOW game streaming service and related infrastructure, and solutions for gaming platforms; Quadro/NVIDIA RTX GPUs for enterprise workstation graphics; virtual GPU or vGPU software for cloud-based visual and virtual computing; automotive platforms for infotainment systems; and Omniverse software for building and operating metaverse and 3D internet applications.