Investors Buy Large Volume of Put Options on Petco Health and Wellness (NASDAQ:WOOF)

Petco Health and Wellness Company, Inc. (NASDAQ:WOOF) saw unusually large options trading activity on Thursday. Stock traders purchased 22,057 put options on the company. This represents an increase of approximately 1,194% compared to the typical volume of 1,704 put options.

Institutional Trading of Petco Health and Wellness

A number of hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in the business. Simplicity Wealth LLC acquired a new stake in Petco Health and Wellness in the 1st quarter valued at about $1,138,000. Norden Group LLC bought a new position in Petco Health and Wellness in the 1st quarter valued at $309,000. Virtu Financial LLC increased its stake in shares of Petco Health and Wellness by 120.7% in the 4th quarter. Virtu Financial LLC now owns 108,079 shares of the company’s stock valued at $342,000 after buying an additional 59,118 shares during the period. CastleKnight Management LP bought a new stake in shares of Petco Health and Wellness during the fourth quarter worth $1,367,000. Finally, Boulder Hill Capital Management LP acquired a new position in shares of Petco Health and Wellness during the fourth quarter valued at $852,000.

Analyst Ratings Changes

WOOF has been the subject of several recent research reports. Evercore ISI cut their price objective on Petco Health and Wellness from $4.00 to $3.00 and set an “in-line” rating for the company in a report on Friday, March 15th. Needham & Company LLC reissued a “buy” rating and issued a $5.00 price target on shares of Petco Health and Wellness in a research note on Wednesday, March 13th. Wells Fargo & Company cut their price objective on shares of Petco Health and Wellness from $3.00 to $2.00 and set an “equal weight” rating on the stock in a research report on Monday, March 25th. Royal Bank of Canada dropped their price target on shares of Petco Health and Wellness from $3.50 to $2.70 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a research note on Friday, March 15th. Finally, UBS Group decreased their price objective on shares of Petco Health and Wellness from $3.00 to $2.50 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a report on Wednesday, March 20th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, nine have assigned a hold rating and four have given a buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat.com, Petco Health and Wellness has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $3.65.

Petco Health and Wellness Price Performance

Petco Health and Wellness stock opened at $1.51 on Friday. The business has a 50 day simple moving average of $2.15 and a 200 day simple moving average of $2.81. Petco Health and Wellness has a one year low of $1.41 and a one year high of $10.76. The company has a market capitalization of $464.13 million, a PE ratio of -0.32 and a beta of 1.15. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.33, a current ratio of 0.86 and a quick ratio of 0.24.

Petco Health and Wellness (NASDAQ:WOOF) last posted its earnings results on Wednesday, March 13th. The company reported $0.02 earnings per share for the quarter, hitting the consensus estimate of $0.02. The business had revenue of $1.67 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.63 billion. Petco Health and Wellness had a negative net margin of 20.47% and a negative return on equity of 2.20%. The firm’s quarterly revenue was up 6.1% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the prior year, the firm earned $0.17 EPS. On average, sell-side analysts forecast that Petco Health and Wellness will post -0.23 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Petco Health and Wellness Company Profile

Petco Health and Wellness Company, Inc, operates as a health and wellness company, focuses on enhancing the lives of pets, pet parents, and its Petco partners in the United States, Mexico, and Puerto Rico. The company provides veterinary care, grooming, training, tele-health, and Vital Care and pet health insurance services, as well as veterinary services through Vetco mobile clinics.