Short Interest in Forward Air Co. (NASDAQ:FWRD) Rises By 6.1%

Forward Air Co. (NASDAQ:FWRD) was the recipient of a significant growth in short interest in July. As of July 15th, there was short interest totalling 5,880,000 shares, a growth of 6.1% from the June 30th total of 5,540,000 shares. Approximately 31.7% of the shares of the company are short sold. Based on an average daily volume of 1,280,000 shares, the short-interest ratio is currently 4.6 days.

Forward Air Trading Down 5.4 %

Shares of FWRD opened at $23.98 on Friday. The firm has a 50 day moving average price of $20.56 and a 200-day moving average price of $27.91. Forward Air has a fifty-two week low of $11.21 and a fifty-two week high of $119.15. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.27, a quick ratio of 1.28 and a current ratio of 1.28. The firm has a market cap of $634.03 million, a price-to-earnings ratio of 7.01 and a beta of 1.00.

Forward Air (NASDAQ:FWRD) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, May 8th. The transportation company reported ($0.64) EPS for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of ($0.15) by ($0.49). Forward Air had a net margin of 4.08% and a return on equity of 5.37%. The firm had revenue of $541.81 million for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $644.00 million. During the same quarter in the prior year, the company earned $1.37 earnings per share. As a group, equities research analysts forecast that Forward Air will post -0.46 earnings per share for the current year.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Forward Air

A number of hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in FWRD. Rhumbline Advisers increased its position in Forward Air by 2.1% during the 2nd quarter. Rhumbline Advisers now owns 89,457 shares of the transportation company’s stock valued at $1,703,000 after purchasing an additional 1,828 shares during the period. Zurcher Kantonalbank Zurich Cantonalbank increased its position in Forward Air by 33.3% during the 2nd quarter. Zurcher Kantonalbank Zurich Cantonalbank now owns 7,218 shares of the transportation company’s stock valued at $137,000 after purchasing an additional 1,803 shares during the period. Bfsg LLC increased its position in Forward Air by 21.4% during the 2nd quarter. Bfsg LLC now owns 10,096 shares of the transportation company’s stock valued at $192,000 after purchasing an additional 1,783 shares during the period. Louisiana State Employees Retirement System increased its position in Forward Air by 3.9% during the 2nd quarter. Louisiana State Employees Retirement System now owns 15,900 shares of the transportation company’s stock valued at $303,000 after purchasing an additional 600 shares during the period. Finally, Boston Trust Walden Corp purchased a new position in Forward Air during the 2nd quarter valued at $611,000. 97.03% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

FWRD has been the subject of several recent research reports. Wolfe Research upgraded shares of Forward Air from an “underperform” rating to a “peer perform” rating in a research note on Tuesday, May 28th. Robert W. Baird boosted their price objective on shares of Forward Air from $14.00 to $17.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Wednesday, July 3rd. Finally, Benchmark reaffirmed a “hold” rating on shares of Forward Air in a research note on Wednesday, April 24th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, five have given a hold rating and three have assigned a buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the company presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $76.86.

About Forward Air

Forward Air Corporation, together with its subsidiaries, operates as an asset-light freight and logistics company in the United States and Canada. It operates in two segments, Expedited Freight and Intermodal. The Expedited Freight segment provides expedited regional, inter-regional, and national less-than-truckload services; local pick-up and delivery services; and other services, which include shipment consolidation and deconsolidation, warehousing, customs brokerage, and other handling.