Illumina (NASDAQ:ILMN) Hits New 12-Month High – Still a Buy?

Illumina, Inc. (NASDAQ:ILMN)’s stock price reached a new 52-week high during mid-day trading on Thursday . The stock traded as high as $210.93 and last traded at $211.8860, with a volume of 197905 shares trading hands. The stock had previously closed at $205.00.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of research analysts recently commented on the stock. Sanford C. Bernstein reiterated a “market perform” rating and issued a $215.00 price target on shares of Illumina in a research note on Friday, July 31st. Daiwa Securities Group raised Illumina from a “neutral” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $155.00 target price on the stock in a research report on Thursday, May 14th. Guggenheim lifted their price target on Illumina from $200.00 to $226.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Friday, July 31st. Evercore restated an “outperform” rating on shares of Illumina in a research note on Monday, July 6th. Finally, Weiss Ratings upgraded Illumina from a “hold (c-)” rating to a “hold (c)” rating in a research report on Wednesday, June 3rd. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, eight have assigned a Buy rating, six have issued a Hold rating and two have assigned a Sell rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, the company currently has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $188.40.

Illumina Stock Performance

The stock has a market capitalization of $31.99 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 39.52, a PEG ratio of 2.65 and a beta of 1.45. The company’s 50-day simple moving average is $185.90 and its 200-day simple moving average is $151.49. The company has a current ratio of 1.80, a quick ratio of 1.40 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.53.

Illumina (NASDAQ:ILMN) last released its earnings results on Thursday, July 30th. The life sciences company reported $1.31 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.23 by $0.08. Illumina had a net margin of 18.36% and a return on equity of 29.84%. The company had revenue of $1.16 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $1.13 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the company earned $1.19 EPS. Illumina’s quarterly revenue was up 9.4% compared to the same quarter last year. Illumina has set its FY 2026 guidance at 5.300-5.400 EPS. On average, analysts expect that Illumina, Inc. will post 5.36 EPS for the current year.

Insider Transactions at Illumina

In other news, Director Keith A. Meister sold 283,269 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, August 5th. The shares were sold at an average price of $199.61, for a total value of $56,543,325.09. Following the sale, the director owned 2,089,425 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $417,070,124.25. The trade was a 11.94% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available at the SEC website. Also, SVP Patricia Leckman sold 783 shares of Illumina stock in a transaction dated Friday, June 5th. The shares were sold at an average price of $162.59, for a total value of $127,307.97. Following the transaction, the senior vice president directly owned 21,259 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $3,456,500.81. The trade was a 3.55% decrease in their position. Additional details regarding this sale are available in the official SEC disclosure. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Over the last 90 days, insiders have sold 1,415,351 shares of company stock valued at $255,966,311. 2.90% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Illumina

Several institutional investors and hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in ILMN. Capital World Investors raised its position in Illumina by 0.6% in the 4th quarter. Capital World Investors now owns 20,101,173 shares of the life sciences company’s stock worth $2,636,483,000 after buying an additional 124,323 shares during the last quarter. BlackRock Inc. bought a new position in Illumina in the second quarter worth approximately $3,374,423,000. State Street Corp lifted its position in Illumina by 3.2% during the fourth quarter. State Street Corp now owns 6,190,114 shares of the life sciences company’s stock valued at $811,895,000 after purchasing an additional 190,324 shares in the last quarter. WCM Investment Management LLC grew its stake in shares of Illumina by 45.5% during the 1st quarter. WCM Investment Management LLC now owns 5,923,173 shares of the life sciences company’s stock valued at $715,579,000 after acquiring an additional 1,851,848 shares during the period. Finally, AQR Capital Management LLC increased its stake in Illumina by 30.3% in the 4th quarter. AQR Capital Management LLC now owns 4,426,126 shares of the life sciences company’s stock worth $580,531,000 after buying an additional 1,028,099 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors own 89.42% of the company’s stock.

About Illumina

Illumina, Inc (NASDAQ: ILMN) is a global life sciences company that develops, manufactures and markets integrated systems for the analysis of genetic variation and function. Headquartered in San Diego, California and founded in 1998, Illumina offers a range of sequencing and array-based technologies used by academic researchers, clinical laboratories, pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies, consumer genomics firms and agricultural researchers to enable discovery, translational research and clinical applications.

The company’s product portfolio includes next-generation sequencing (NGS) platforms and associated consumables, microarrays for genotyping and methylation analysis, library preparation kits and targeted assays.