Fox Co. (NASDAQ:FOXA) Sees Significant Drop in Short Interest

Fox Co. (NASDAQ:FOXA) saw a large decline in short interest during the month of December. As of December 31st, there was short interest totalling 23,820,000 shares, a decline of 6.7% from the December 15th total of 25,540,000 shares. Currently, 10.9% of the shares of the stock are sold short. Based on an average daily volume of 3,370,000 shares, the days-to-cover ratio is currently 7.1 days.

FOX Price Performance

NASDAQ FOXA traded down $0.32 during mid-day trading on Friday, hitting $48.00. The stock had a trading volume of 3,970,549 shares, compared to its average volume of 2,980,282. The company has a 50 day simple moving average of $47.72 and a 200 day simple moving average of $42.69. The company has a market cap of $21.92 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 11.74, a P/E/G ratio of 1.19 and a beta of 0.75. FOX has a 52-week low of $28.28 and a 52-week high of $50.63. The company has a quick ratio of 2.33, a current ratio of 2.59 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.58.

FOX (NASDAQ:FOXA) last released its quarterly earnings results on Monday, November 4th. The company reported $1.45 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $1.12 by $0.33. The business had revenue of $3.56 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $3.38 billion. FOX had a return on equity of 16.49% and a net margin of 13.40%. The business’s revenue was up 11.1% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the previous year, the company posted $1.09 EPS. Equities analysts forecast that FOX will post 4.08 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of research firms have commented on FOXA. The Goldman Sachs Group upped their price target on FOX from $51.00 to $57.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Thursday, December 19th. Citigroup increased their target price on shares of FOX from $50.00 to $58.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Wednesday, December 18th. Evercore ISI upgraded FOX to a “hold” rating in a research note on Tuesday, November 5th. StockNews.com downgraded shares of FOX from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Tuesday, December 17th. Finally, Morgan Stanley lifted their price objective on shares of FOX from $38.00 to $40.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research report on Friday, November 1st. Two analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, nine have given a hold rating and seven have issued a buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat, FOX currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $48.00.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other FOX news, Chairman Keith Rupert Murdoch sold 100,000 shares of FOX stock in a transaction on Wednesday, November 6th. The stock was sold at an average price of $42.05, for a total value of $4,205,000.00. Following the sale, the chairman now owns 1,258,862 shares in the company, valued at $52,935,147.10. The trade was a 7.36 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through the SEC website. Also, COO John Nallen sold 182,481 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, November 5th. The shares were sold at an average price of $43.73, for a total transaction of $7,979,894.13. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief operating officer now directly owns 249,424 shares in the company, valued at $10,907,311.52. The trade was a 42.25 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 469,352 shares of company stock valued at $20,822,072 in the last 90 days. 21.77% of the stock is owned by insiders.

Institutional Trading of FOX

Institutional investors and hedge funds have recently modified their holdings of the business. Independent Franchise Partners LLP lifted its holdings in FOX by 3.3% in the 2nd quarter. Independent Franchise Partners LLP now owns 18,495,954 shares of the company’s stock valued at $635,706,000 after purchasing an additional 597,450 shares in the last quarter. Pacer Advisors Inc. lifted its stake in shares of FOX by 44,205.3% during the 3rd quarter. Pacer Advisors Inc. now owns 7,915,576 shares of the company’s stock worth $335,066,000 after purchasing an additional 7,897,710 shares during the period. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP increased its stake in FOX by 7.7% in the second quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP now owns 3,758,734 shares of the company’s stock valued at $129,180,000 after purchasing an additional 268,778 shares during the last quarter. D. E. Shaw & Co. Inc. increased its stake in FOX by 25.5% in the second quarter. D. E. Shaw & Co. Inc. now owns 2,420,940 shares of the company’s stock valued at $83,208,000 after purchasing an additional 492,467 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Jacobs Levy Equity Management Inc. lifted its position in FOX by 228.4% during the third quarter. Jacobs Levy Equity Management Inc. now owns 1,387,107 shares of the company’s stock worth $58,716,000 after buying an additional 964,737 shares during the period. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 52.52% of the company’s stock.

About FOX

Fox Corporation operates as a news, sports, and entertainment company in the United States (U.S.). The company operates through four segments: Cable Network Programming, Television, Credible, and The FOX Studio Lot. The Cable Network Programming segment produces and licenses news and sports content for distribution through traditional cable television systems, direct broadcast satellite operators and telecommunication companies, virtual multi-channel video programming distributors, and other digital platforms primarily in the U.S.