Oppenheimer Lowers Veeco Instruments (NASDAQ:VECO) Price Target to $40.00

Veeco Instruments (NASDAQ:VECO) had its price objective dropped by equities researchers at Oppenheimer from $45.00 to $40.00 in a research note issued to investors on Thursday,Benzinga reports. The brokerage currently has an “outperform” rating on the semiconductor company’s stock. Oppenheimer’s price objective points to a potential upside of 37.74% from the company’s previous close.

Several other research analysts have also issued reports on the stock. Northland Securities cut their target price on shares of Veeco Instruments from $53.00 to $47.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a research note on Wednesday, August 7th. Citigroup lowered shares of Veeco Instruments from a “buy” rating to a “neutral” rating and increased their target price for the stock from $45.00 to $50.00 in a research note on Monday, July 15th. Needham & Company LLC reissued a “buy” rating and set a $55.00 target price on shares of Veeco Instruments in a research note on Wednesday, August 7th. StockNews.com raised shares of Veeco Instruments from a “sell” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Thursday, October 31st. Finally, The Goldman Sachs Group cut their target price on shares of Veeco Instruments from $35.00 to $30.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a research note on Thursday. Four analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and four have given a buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $42.14.

Veeco Instruments Trading Down 3.5 %

Shares of VECO traded down $1.06 during trading hours on Thursday, hitting $29.04. 594,218 shares of the stock were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 659,667. Veeco Instruments has a fifty-two week low of $26.23 and a fifty-two week high of $49.25. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.35, a current ratio of 3.52 and a quick ratio of 2.32. The business has a 50-day moving average of $31.33 and a 200-day moving average of $37.51. The firm has a market capitalization of $1.65 billion, a P/E ratio of 20.60 and a beta of 1.17.

Veeco Instruments (NASDAQ:VECO) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, August 6th. The semiconductor company reported $0.42 earnings per share for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $0.43 by ($0.01). The firm had revenue of $175.88 million for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $176.03 million. Veeco Instruments had a return on equity of 12.03% and a net margin of 11.83%. The company’s quarterly revenue was up 8.8% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter last year, the company earned $0.21 earnings per share. On average, research analysts expect that Veeco Instruments will post 1.2 EPS for the current year.

Insider Activity

In other news, CFO John P. Kiernan sold 2,500 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, September 10th. The shares were sold at an average price of $29.04, for a total value of $72,600.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief financial officer now owns 85,142 shares in the company, valued at $2,472,523.68. This represents a 0.00 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available at this hyperlink. 2.20% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

Institutional Trading of Veeco Instruments

Several institutional investors and hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in the company. Vanguard Group Inc. increased its holdings in Veeco Instruments by 5.8% during the first quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 7,131,073 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock worth $250,800,000 after buying an additional 391,346 shares during the last quarter. Driehaus Capital Management LLC increased its holdings in Veeco Instruments by 119.3% during the second quarter. Driehaus Capital Management LLC now owns 1,458,288 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock worth $68,117,000 after buying an additional 793,429 shares during the last quarter. Baillie Gifford & Co. increased its holdings in Veeco Instruments by 32.2% during the third quarter. Baillie Gifford & Co. now owns 631,011 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock worth $20,905,000 after buying an additional 153,754 shares during the last quarter. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. increased its holdings in Veeco Instruments by 5.6% during the second quarter. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. now owns 598,014 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock worth $27,933,000 after buying an additional 31,482 shares during the last quarter. Finally, New York State Common Retirement Fund increased its holdings in Veeco Instruments by 249.0% during the third quarter. New York State Common Retirement Fund now owns 430,757 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock worth $14,271,000 after buying an additional 307,348 shares during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 98.46% of the company’s stock.

About Veeco Instruments

Veeco Instruments Inc, together with its subsidiaries, develops, manufactures, sells, and supports semiconductor and thin film process equipment primarily to make electronic devices in the United States, Europe, the Middle East, and Africa, China, Rest of the Asia-Pacific, and internationally. The company offers laser annealing, ion beam deposition and etch, metal organic chemical vapor deposition, single wafer wet processing and surface preparation, molecular beam epitaxy, advanced packaging lithography, atomic layer deposition, and other deposition systems.