Simulations Plus, Inc. (NASDAQ:SLP) Given Consensus Rating of “Reduce” by Analysts

Simulations Plus, Inc. (NASDAQ:SLP) has earned an average rating of “Reduce” from the eight analysts that are presently covering the stock, MarketBeat reports. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating and seven have assigned a hold rating to the company. The average twelve-month target price among brokerages that have issued ratings on the stock in the last year is $17.25.

SLP has been the subject of a number of recent research reports. Weiss Ratings upgraded Simulations Plus from a “sell (d)” rating to a “sell (d+)” rating in a research report on Friday, July 10th. Craig Hallum lowered shares of Simulations Plus from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating and set a $18.50 price objective for the company. in a report on Thursday, June 18th. Wall Street Zen cut shares of Simulations Plus from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Saturday, June 13th. Finally, William Blair lowered shares of Simulations Plus from an “outperform” rating to a “market perform” rating in a report on Wednesday, June 17th.

Insider Transactions at Simulations Plus

In other Simulations Plus news, Director Walter S. Woltosz sold 4,177 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, July 1st. The shares were sold at an average price of $18.44, for a total transaction of $77,023.88. Following the completion of the sale, the director directly owned 3,202,131 shares in the company, valued at $59,047,295.64. This represents a 0.13% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available at this hyperlink. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. 19.10% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Simulations Plus

A number of hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently modified their holdings of the stock. First Light Asset Management LLC grew its position in Simulations Plus by 33.7% during the 1st quarter. First Light Asset Management LLC now owns 2,632,823 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $31,120,000 after acquiring an additional 663,906 shares during the last quarter. BlackRock Inc. bought a new stake in Simulations Plus in the second quarter valued at approximately $27,503,000. Ameriprise Financial Inc. lifted its position in Simulations Plus by 25.3% in the second quarter. Ameriprise Financial Inc. now owns 875,447 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $15,277,000 after purchasing an additional 176,747 shares during the last quarter. Marshall Wace LLP boosted its stake in shares of Simulations Plus by 127.5% during the fourth quarter. Marshall Wace LLP now owns 569,783 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $10,387,000 after purchasing an additional 319,301 shares during the period. Finally, Stephens Investment Management Group LLC boosted its stake in shares of Simulations Plus by 30.8% during the fourth quarter. Stephens Investment Management Group LLC now owns 513,728 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $9,365,000 after purchasing an additional 120,888 shares during the period. Institutional investors own 78.08% of the company’s stock.

Simulations Plus Price Performance

Shares of Simulations Plus stock opened at $18.35 on Thursday. Simulations Plus has a 1 year low of $11.09 and a 1 year high of $21.01. The firm has a market cap of $371.22 million, a PE ratio of 45.88 and a beta of 1.32. The company has a 50 day simple moving average of $17.87 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $15.34.

Simulations Plus (NASDAQ:SLP) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, July 9th. The technology company reported $0.30 EPS for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.23 by $0.07. Simulations Plus had a net margin of 9.88% and a return on equity of 13.50%. The firm had revenue of $21.89 million for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $20.90 million. As a group, research analysts anticipate that Simulations Plus will post 0.8 earnings per share for the current year.

Simulations Plus Company Profile

Simulations Plus, Inc (NASDAQ: SLP) specializes in advanced modeling and simulation software tailored to the pharmaceutical, biotechnology and chemical industries. The company’s flagship products include ADMET Predictor, a quantitative structure-activity relationship (QSAR) tool for predicting absorption, distribution, metabolism, excretion and toxicity properties, and GastroPlus, a physiologically based pharmacokinetic (PBPK) modeling platform for simulating drug absorption and pharmacokinetics.