Veeco Instruments (NASDAQ:VECO) Cut to Sell at StockNews.com

StockNews.com lowered shares of Veeco Instruments (NASDAQ:VECO) from a hold rating to a sell rating in a research note published on Thursday morning.

VECO has been the topic of several other reports. Benchmark reduced their price target on Veeco Instruments from $42.00 to $38.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research report on Thursday, November 7th. The Goldman Sachs Group cut their target price on shares of Veeco Instruments from $35.00 to $30.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a report on Thursday, November 7th. Needham & Company LLC reiterated a “buy” rating and set a $55.00 price target on shares of Veeco Instruments in a report on Wednesday, August 7th. Northland Securities cut their price target on shares of Veeco Instruments from $53.00 to $47.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a report on Wednesday, August 7th. Finally, Oppenheimer reduced their price target on Veeco Instruments from $45.00 to $40.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a report on Thursday, November 7th. One analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, three have assigned a hold rating and four have given a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $42.14.

Veeco Instruments Stock Up 0.9 %

Shares of VECO opened at $27.87 on Thursday. Veeco Instruments has a 1 year low of $25.52 and a 1 year high of $49.25. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.33, a current ratio of 3.54 and a quick ratio of 2.41. The stock has a 50 day simple moving average of $29.91 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $36.47. The firm has a market cap of $1.58 billion, a P/E ratio of 20.64 and a beta of 1.17.

Veeco Instruments (NASDAQ:VECO) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, November 6th. The semiconductor company reported $0.46 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.45 by $0.01. Veeco Instruments had a net margin of 11.34% and a return on equity of 10.92%. The business had revenue of $184.80 million during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $180.57 million. During the same period in the previous year, the firm posted $0.41 earnings per share. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was up 4.2% on a year-over-year basis. On average, analysts forecast that Veeco Instruments will post 1.12 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Veeco Instruments news, CFO John P. Kiernan sold 2,500 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Thursday, October 10th. The shares were sold at an average price of $32.63, for a total value of $81,575.00. Following the sale, the chief financial officer now owns 82,642 shares in the company, valued at $2,696,608.46. The trade was a 2.94 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through the SEC website. In the last quarter, insiders sold 7,500 shares of company stock worth $225,850. Corporate insiders own 2.40% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Veeco Instruments

Large investors have recently made changes to their positions in the company. Signaturefd LLC boosted its stake in Veeco Instruments by 130.6% during the third quarter. Signaturefd LLC now owns 1,328 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock valued at $44,000 after buying an additional 752 shares during the last quarter. KBC Group NV grew its holdings in shares of Veeco Instruments by 46.8% in the third quarter. KBC Group NV now owns 2,088 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock valued at $69,000 after purchasing an additional 666 shares in the last quarter. GAMMA Investing LLC increased its position in Veeco Instruments by 237.4% in the second quarter. GAMMA Investing LLC now owns 1,677 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock worth $78,000 after purchasing an additional 1,180 shares during the last quarter. nVerses Capital LLC raised its stake in Veeco Instruments by 733.3% during the second quarter. nVerses Capital LLC now owns 2,500 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock valued at $117,000 after purchasing an additional 2,200 shares in the last quarter. Finally, US Bancorp DE lifted its position in Veeco Instruments by 14.8% during the third quarter. US Bancorp DE now owns 3,864 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock valued at $128,000 after purchasing an additional 498 shares during the last quarter. 98.46% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Veeco Instruments Company Profile

Veeco Instruments Inc, together with its subsidiaries, develops, manufactures, sells, and supports semiconductor and thin film process equipment primarily to make electronic devices in the United States, Europe, the Middle East, and Africa, China, Rest of the Asia-Pacific, and internationally. The company offers laser annealing, ion beam deposition and etch, metal organic chemical vapor deposition, single wafer wet processing and surface preparation, molecular beam epitaxy, advanced packaging lithography, atomic layer deposition, and other deposition systems.