AXT (NASDAQ:AXTI) Stock Price Up 10.4% – Should You Buy?

AXT Inc (NASDAQ:AXTI) shares rose 10.4% during mid-day trading on Tuesday. The stock traded as high as $52.35 and last traded at $53.2050. Approximately 2,601,934 shares were traded during mid-day trading, a decline of 74% from the average session volume of 10,132,807 shares. The stock had previously closed at $48.20.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several equities research analysts have recently commented on AXTI shares. Zacks Research downgraded AXT from a “strong-buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a report on Tuesday, September 29th. UBS Group set a $90.00 price objective on shares of AXT in a report on Friday, July 31st. B. Riley Financial lifted their price objective on shares of AXT from $55.00 to $56.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a report on Friday. Needham & Company LLC raised shares of AXT from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating and set a $90.00 target price for the company in a research report on Friday, July 31st. Finally, Weiss Ratings raised shares of AXT from a “sell (d-)” rating to a “sell (d+)” rating in a research report on Friday, August 14th. Three investment analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating, two have issued a Hold rating and one has assigned a Sell rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat, AXT presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $77.80.

AXT Trading Up 7.1%

The business’s fifty day simple moving average is $65.81 and its 200-day simple moving average is $64.20. The firm has a market cap of $3.39 billion, a P/E ratio of 114.33 and a beta of 1.86.

AXT (NASDAQ:AXTI) last announced its earnings results on Thursday, October 29th. The semiconductor company reported $0.41 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.31 by $0.10. The business had revenue of $73.41 million during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $66.00 million. AXT had a net margin of 3.23% and a return on equity of 0.96%. As a group, research analysts expect that AXT Inc will post 0.80 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Insider Buying and Selling at AXT

In other AXT news, Director Leonard Leblanc sold 4,000 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, August 17th. The stock was sold at an average price of $96.07, for a total transaction of $384,280.00. Following the sale, the director directly owned 113,129 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $10,868,303.03. This trade represents a 3.42% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through the SEC website. Company insiders own 5.97% of the company’s stock.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On AXT

Large investors have recently made changes to their positions in the business. American Capital Advisory LLC acquired a new stake in shares of AXT in the 1st quarter worth $27,000. Reyes Financial Architecture Inc. acquired a new stake in AXT in the third quarter valued at $42,000. Global Retirement Partners LLC acquired a new position in shares of AXT in the 2nd quarter valued at $55,000. Leonteq Securities AG purchased a new position in shares of AXT during the first quarter worth about $57,000. Finally, Signaturefd LLC raised its position in AXT by 440.9% in the 3rd quarter. Signaturefd LLC now owns 952 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock valued at $74,000 after purchasing an additional 776 shares during the last quarter. 49.52% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

AXT Company Profile

AXT, Inc develops and manufactures compound semiconductor substrates used as the foundation for various high-performance electronic and optoelectronic devices. Its principal products include gallium arsenide (GaAs), indium phosphide (InP), and germanium substrates, along with other specialty materials such as gallium antimonide and indium arsenide.

The company’s substrates are used in applications including wireless communications, fiber-optic and data-center networks, lasers, light-emitting diodes, solar cells, consumer electronics, and aerospace and defense systems.