Insider Selling: Applied Optoelectronics (NASDAQ:AAOI) Insider Sells 12,500 Shares of Stock

Applied Optoelectronics, Inc. (NASDAQ:AAOI) insider David Kuo sold 12,500 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Tuesday, December 23rd. The shares were sold at an average price of $40.15, for a total transaction of $501,875.00. Following the sale, the insider owned 130,948 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $5,257,562.20. The trade was a 8.71% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through the SEC website.

Applied Optoelectronics Stock Performance

AAOI traded down $0.42 on Monday, hitting $36.75. 3,683,968 shares of the company’s stock were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 4,742,815. The company has a current ratio of 2.31, a quick ratio of 1.63 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.23. The stock has a fifty day moving average of $29.50 and a two-hundred day moving average of $27.04. Applied Optoelectronics, Inc. has a twelve month low of $9.71 and a twelve month high of $41.96. The firm has a market cap of $2.51 billion, a PE ratio of -11.41 and a beta of 3.26.

Applied Optoelectronics (NASDAQ:AAOI) last posted its earnings results on Thursday, November 6th. The semiconductor company reported ($0.09) EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of ($0.10) by $0.01. The company had revenue of $118.63 million during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $119.77 million. Applied Optoelectronics had a negative return on equity of 7.34% and a negative net margin of 36.97%.The business’s revenue was up 82.1% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the prior year, the company earned ($0.21) earnings per share. Applied Optoelectronics has set its Q4 2025 guidance at -0.130–0.040 EPS. On average, research analysts anticipate that Applied Optoelectronics, Inc. will post -1.18 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several equities research analysts have commented on the stock. Northland Securities set a $45.00 price target on shares of Applied Optoelectronics in a research note on Thursday, December 11th. Rosenblatt Securities restated a “buy” rating and issued a $50.00 target price on shares of Applied Optoelectronics in a research report on Friday, December 19th. Needham & Company LLC lifted their price target on Applied Optoelectronics from $38.00 to $43.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Thursday, December 11th. B. Riley reaffirmed a “sell” rating and set a $15.00 target price on shares of Applied Optoelectronics in a report on Monday, November 10th. Finally, Weiss Ratings reissued a “sell (d-)” rating on shares of Applied Optoelectronics in a research note on Wednesday, October 8th. Four investment analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating, one has issued a Hold rating and two have given a Sell rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company presently has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $35.60.

Institutional Trading of Applied Optoelectronics

Several hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently modified their holdings of the business. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. lifted its stake in Applied Optoelectronics by 5.2% in the 1st quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. now owns 124,432 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock worth $1,910,000 after acquiring an additional 6,183 shares in the last quarter. Invesco Ltd. lifted its position in shares of Applied Optoelectronics by 17.3% in the first quarter. Invesco Ltd. now owns 40,556 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock worth $623,000 after purchasing an additional 5,971 shares in the last quarter. Nuveen LLC acquired a new stake in shares of Applied Optoelectronics during the first quarter worth approximately $1,643,000. AlphaQuest LLC grew its position in Applied Optoelectronics by 243.9% during the first quarter. AlphaQuest LLC now owns 2,297 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock valued at $35,000 after purchasing an additional 1,629 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Jump Financial LLC purchased a new stake in Applied Optoelectronics in the 1st quarter worth approximately $746,000. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 61.70% of the company’s stock.

Applied Optoelectronics Company Profile

Applied Optoelectronics, Inc develops and manufactures high-speed fiber-optic networking products designed to support the growing bandwidth demands of data centers, telecommunications carriers and internet content providers. The company’s core offerings include pluggable optical transceiver modules, transponders and optical components that enable data transmission at rates ranging from 1G to 400G. These products are used to facilitate long-haul, metro and intra-data center connectivity, addressing the need for scalable, low-latency and energy-efficient solutions in modern network infrastructures.

The company’s product portfolio spans small-form factor pluggable modules such as SFP+, QSFP+ and QSFP28 units, as well as more advanced form factors like CFP2 and OSFP for ultra-high-speed applications.