Workday, Inc. (NASDAQ:WDAY) Sees Large Increase in Short Interest

Workday, Inc. (NASDAQ:WDAY) saw a large growth in short interest during the month of April. As of April 15th, there was short interest totalling 4,900,000 shares, a growth of 21.0% from the March 31st total of 4,050,000 shares. Based on an average daily trading volume, of 1,840,000 shares, the short-interest ratio is currently 2.7 days.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, major shareholder David A. Duffield sold 64,329 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Friday, March 15th. The stock was sold at an average price of $268.85, for a total value of $17,294,851.65. Following the transaction, the insider now owns 102,997 shares in the company, valued at approximately $27,690,743.45. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available at this hyperlink. In other Workday news, major shareholder David A. Duffield sold 56,000 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Friday, April 12th. The shares were sold at an average price of $264.89, for a total value of $14,833,840.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the insider now owns 843,000 shares in the company, valued at $223,302,270. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through this hyperlink. Also, major shareholder David A. Duffield sold 64,329 shares of Workday stock in a transaction dated Friday, March 15th. The stock was sold at an average price of $268.85, for a total value of $17,294,851.65. Following the sale, the insider now owns 102,997 shares in the company, valued at approximately $27,690,743.45. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold 435,691 shares of company stock valued at $117,731,569 in the last ninety days. Insiders own 21.09% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Workday

Hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in the business. Vanguard Group Inc. raised its holdings in shares of Workday by 3.1% in the 4th quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 14,448,125 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $3,988,549,000 after purchasing an additional 437,215 shares during the period. Norges Bank purchased a new position in Workday in the 4th quarter valued at about $1,491,149,000. Wellington Management Group LLP grew its stake in shares of Workday by 37.4% during the third quarter. Wellington Management Group LLP now owns 5,163,362 shares of the software maker’s stock valued at $1,109,348,000 after acquiring an additional 1,406,153 shares in the last quarter. Polen Capital Management LLC increased its position in shares of Workday by 2.0% during the third quarter. Polen Capital Management LLC now owns 3,950,320 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $848,726,000 after acquiring an additional 78,352 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Morgan Stanley lifted its stake in shares of Workday by 47.0% in the third quarter. Morgan Stanley now owns 2,727,580 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $586,021,000 after acquiring an additional 872,288 shares in the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 89.81% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several research firms have recently weighed in on WDAY. UBS Group decreased their price objective on Workday from $315.00 to $300.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a report on Tuesday, February 27th. Stifel Nicolaus raised their price objective on shares of Workday from $250.00 to $290.00 and gave the stock a “hold” rating in a research report on Tuesday, February 27th. The Goldman Sachs Group upped their target price on shares of Workday from $270.00 to $310.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Tuesday, February 27th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. raised their price target on Workday from $260.00 to $300.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a report on Thursday, February 22nd. Finally, StockNews.com downgraded Workday from a “strong-buy” rating to a “buy” rating in a research note on Monday, April 8th. One analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, six have issued a hold rating and twenty-two have given a buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, the company currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $293.61.

Workday Trading Down 1.6 %

Shares of WDAY stock opened at $244.73 on Wednesday. Workday has a twelve month low of $174.25 and a twelve month high of $311.28. The company has a market capitalization of $64.61 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 47.52, a PEG ratio of 6.27 and a beta of 1.32. The firm has a 50-day moving average price of $271.27 and a 200 day moving average price of $264.80. The company has a current ratio of 1.97, a quick ratio of 1.97 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.37.

Workday (NASDAQ:WDAY) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Monday, February 26th. The software maker reported $1.57 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.47 by $0.10. The business had revenue of $1.92 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $1.92 billion. Workday had a net margin of 19.02% and a return on equity of 4.87%. The company’s quarterly revenue was up 16.8% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the prior year, the firm posted ($0.14) earnings per share. Research analysts forecast that Workday will post 1.76 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

About Workday

Workday, Inc provides enterprise cloud applications in the United States and internationally. Its applications help its customers to plan, execute, analyze, and extend to other applications and environments to manage their business and operations. The company offers a suite of financial management applications to maintain accounting information in the general ledger; manage financial processes, such as payables and receivables; identify real-time financial, operational, and management insights; enhance financial consolidation; reduce time-to-close; promote internal control and auditability; and achieve consistency across finance operations.