IAA, Inc. (NYSE:IAA) Short Interest Update

IAA, Inc. (NYSE:IAA – Get Rating) was the target of a significant growth in short interest in the month of February. As of February 28th, there was short interest totalling 9,770,000 shares, a growth of 5.9% from the February 13th total of 9,230,000 shares. Approximately 7.3% of the shares of the company are short sold. Based on an average trading volume of 2,300,000 shares, the days-to-cover ratio is presently 4.2 days.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On IAA

Several hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in IAA. Morgan Stanley grew its position in shares of IAA by 1,056.1% in the fourth quarter. Morgan Stanley now owns 6,691,946 shares of the company’s stock valued at $267,678,000 after purchasing an additional 6,113,112 shares in the last quarter. Thrivent Financial for Lutherans grew its position in shares of IAA by 5,810.8% in the third quarter. Thrivent Financial for Lutherans now owns 2,078,043 shares of the company’s stock valued at $66,186,000 after purchasing an additional 2,042,886 shares in the last quarter. Franklin Resources Inc. grew its position in shares of IAA by 304.7% in the fourth quarter. Franklin Resources Inc. now owns 2,443,716 shares of the company’s stock valued at $97,749,000 after purchasing an additional 1,839,814 shares in the last quarter. Norges Bank purchased a new position in shares of IAA in the fourth quarter valued at $54,229,000. Finally, AQR Arbitrage LLC purchased a new position in shares of IAA in the fourth quarter valued at $48,812,000. 99.77% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Separately, Robert W. Baird lowered IAA from an “outperform” rating to a “neutral” rating and dropped their price target for the stock from $46.00 to $44.00 in a report on Thursday, January 5th. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, four have assigned a hold rating and one has given a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, IAA has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $46.50.

IAA Stock Performance

Shares of IAA opened at $39.93 on Friday. The firm has a market cap of $5.35 billion, a PE ratio of 18.23 and a beta of 1.44. The stock’s fifty day moving average price is $41.03 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $38.41. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.92, a current ratio of 1.75 and a quick ratio of 1.75. IAA has a 1 year low of $31.50 and a 1 year high of $44.07.

IAA (NYSE:IAA – Get Rating) last issued its earnings results on Tuesday, February 21st. The company reported $0.61 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.58 by $0.03. The firm had revenue of $523.50 million for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $524.55 million. IAA had a return on equity of 67.28% and a net margin of 13.93%. The business’s revenue was down 4.5% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the previous year, the company posted $0.61 earnings per share. On average, equities research analysts forecast that IAA will post 2.43 EPS for the current year.

About IAA

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IAA, Inc engages in the provision of auction solutions for total loss, damaged and low-value vehicles. Its solutions focus on a diverse set of global customers, providing buyers with rebuild requirements, replacement part inventory and scrap demand. It operates through the following segments: United States and International.