Afya (NASDAQ:AFYA) Stock Rating Lowered by Wall Street Zen

Afya (NASDAQ:AFYA) was downgraded by equities researchers at Wall Street Zen from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note issued on Saturday, Wall Street Zen reports.

AFYA has been the subject of several other reports. JPMorgan Chase & Co. raised shares of Afya from a “neutral” rating to an “overweight” rating and lowered their price target for the stock from $21.00 to $19.00 in a research note on Wednesday, October 7th. Bank of America raised shares of Afya from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and set a $16.00 price target on the stock in a research report on Thursday. Weiss Ratings downgraded Afya from a “hold (c-)” rating to a “sell (d+)” rating in a research report on Thursday. Zacks Research raised shares of Afya from a “strong sell” rating to a “hold” rating in a report on Monday, October 5th. Finally, Bradesco Corretora raised shares of Afya to an “outperform” rating and set a $17.00 price target for the company in a research note on Thursday, September 24th. Three analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating, three have given a Hold rating and one has assigned a Sell rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, Afya has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $17.00.

Afya Stock Performance

Shares of Afya stock opened at $10.45 on Friday. The stock’s fifty day moving average price is $13.63 and its 200-day moving average price is $14.20. Afya has a 12 month low of $9.66 and a 12 month high of $16.16. The firm has a market cap of $979.37 million, a P/E ratio of 6.37, a P/E/G ratio of 1.64 and a beta of 0.43. The company has a current ratio of 2.20, a quick ratio of 2.20 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.39.

Afya (NASDAQ:AFYA) last released its quarterly earnings results on Friday, August 14th. The company reported $0.43 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.40 by $0.03. The business had revenue of $187.80 million for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $189.62 million. Afya had a net margin of 20.55% and a return on equity of 17.58%. On average, equities research analysts expect that Afya will post 1.72 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Insider Activity at Afya

In other news, insider Santos Welder Ferreira sold 4,161 shares of the stock in a transaction on Monday, October 5th. The shares were sold at an average price of $13.30, for a total value of $55,341.30. Following the completion of the sale, the insider directly owned 35,000 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $465,500. This represents a 10.63% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available at this hyperlink.

Institutional Trading of Afya

An institutional investor recently bought a new position in Afya stock. Public Employees Retirement System of Ohio acquired a new stake in shares of Afya Limited (NASDAQ:AFYA) in the second quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The firm acquired 4,500 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $67,000. 88.02% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

About Afya

Afya Limited is a medical education and digital health company focused on Brazil. Through its educational platform, the company provides undergraduate medical education, medical residency preparation, specialization and continuing medical education programs, and other learning resources for students and physicians.

Afya also offers digital products and services intended to support healthcare professionals throughout their careers. These include clinical content, study tools, telemedicine and practice-management solutions, and subscription-based applications designed to assist physicians with education, clinical decision-making, and patient care.

The company has expanded through the development and acquisition of medical schools, education businesses, and health technology platforms serving different stages of the medical professional lifecycle.