Stock Traders Buy High Volume of Sirius XM Call Options (NASDAQ:SIRI)

Sirius XM Holdings Inc. (NASDAQ:SIRI) was the target of unusually large options trading on Thursday. Stock investors purchased 18,261 call options on the stock. This is an increase of 79% compared to the typical daily volume of 10,208 call options.

Sirius XM Stock Performance

Shares of Sirius XM stock opened at $24.39 on Friday. The stock’s fifty day moving average is $22.05 and its two-hundred day moving average is $22.54. The company has a market capitalization of $8.24 billion, a PE ratio of -3.74, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 0.34 and a beta of 0.92. The company has a quick ratio of 0.42, a current ratio of 0.42 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.93. Sirius XM has a 52 week low of $18.69 and a 52 week high of $41.60.

Sirius XM (NASDAQ:SIRI) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, May 1st. The company reported $0.59 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.70 by ($0.11). Sirius XM had a positive return on equity of 6.77% and a negative net margin of 25.00%. The firm had revenue of $2.07 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $2.09 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the company posted $0.07 EPS. Sirius XM’s quarterly revenue was down 4.3% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, analysts expect that Sirius XM will post 3.2 earnings per share for the current year.

Sirius XM Dividend Announcement

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, May 28th. Stockholders of record on Friday, May 9th were given a dividend of $0.27 per share. This represents a $1.08 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 4.43%. The ex-dividend date was Friday, May 9th. Sirius XM’s payout ratio is -16.56%.

Insider Activity

In other news, Director Kristina Salen sold 1,651 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, May 27th. The stock was sold at an average price of $22.27, for a total transaction of $36,767.77. Following the sale, the director directly owned 15,471 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $344,539.17. This represents a 9.64% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at the SEC website. 3.32% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On Sirius XM

A number of hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in SIRI. Berkshire Hathaway Inc grew its position in shares of Sirius XM by 11.7% during the 4th quarter. Berkshire Hathaway Inc now owns 117,468,573 shares of the company’s stock worth $2,678,283,000 after buying an additional 12,313,544 shares in the last quarter. Fuller & Thaler Asset Management Inc. grew its position in shares of Sirius XM by 661.3% during the 1st quarter. Fuller & Thaler Asset Management Inc. now owns 3,577,176 shares of the company’s stock worth $80,630,000 after buying an additional 3,107,313 shares in the last quarter. LSV Asset Management bought a new position in shares of Sirius XM during the 4th quarter worth $51,535,000. AQR Capital Management LLC grew its position in shares of Sirius XM by 209.9% during the 1st quarter. AQR Capital Management LLC now owns 1,957,518 shares of the company’s stock worth $43,770,000 after buying an additional 1,325,870 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Norges Bank purchased a new stake in shares of Sirius XM during the 4th quarter worth $28,269,000. Institutional investors own 10.69% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several equities analysts have recently weighed in on the company. Seaport Res Ptn raised Sirius XM from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Tuesday, April 8th. Wells Fargo & Company boosted their target price on Sirius XM from $16.00 to $19.00 and gave the company an “underweight” rating in a research report on Wednesday. Barrington Research reissued an “outperform” rating and set a $28.00 target price on shares of Sirius XM in a research report on Friday, May 2nd. Guggenheim reissued a “buy” rating and set a $29.00 target price on shares of Sirius XM in a research report on Thursday, June 26th. Finally, Rosenblatt Securities cut their target price on Sirius XM from $24.00 to $22.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a research report on Friday, May 2nd. Six analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, three have issued a hold rating, four have given a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company presently has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $26.42.

About Sirius XM

Sirius XM Holdings Inc operates as an audio entertainment company in North America. It operates in two segments, Sirius XM, and Pandora and Off-platform. The company’s Sirius XM segment provides music, sports, entertainment, comedy, talk, news, traffic and weather channels, and other content, as well as podcast and infotainment services on subscription fee basis; and live, curated, and exclusive and on demand programming services through satellite radio systems and streamed through applications for mobile and home devices, and other consumer electronic equipment.