POSCO (NYSE:PKX) Shares Gap Up – Still a Buy?

POSCO (NYSE:PKX)’s share price gapped up before the market opened on Wednesday . The stock had previously closed at $52.05, but opened at $53.92. POSCO shares last traded at $54.85, with a volume of 31,609 shares changing hands.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Separately, Weiss Ratings reissued a “sell (d+)” rating on shares of POSCO in a research report on Monday. One analyst has rated the stock with a Buy rating, one has given a Hold rating and one has issued a Sell rating to the company. According to MarketBeat.com, POSCO currently has a consensus rating of “Hold”.

POSCO Trading Up 5.4%

The company’s fifty day moving average is $53.47 and its two-hundred day moving average is $52.73. The company has a quick ratio of 1.38, a current ratio of 1.96 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.25. The stock has a market cap of $16.66 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 74.16, a PEG ratio of 0.37 and a beta of 1.52.

POSCO (NYSE:PKX) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Monday, October 27th. The basic materials company reported $0.94 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.90 by $0.04. POSCO had a net margin of 0.64% and a return on equity of 0.74%. The company had revenue of $12.29 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $12.41 billion. On average, research analysts predict that POSCO will post 3.74 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Institutional Trading of POSCO

A number of institutional investors have recently bought and sold shares of PKX. Nuveen LLC purchased a new position in shares of POSCO in the 1st quarter valued at about $1,090,000. Northern Trust Corp boosted its holdings in POSCO by 5.0% in the first quarter. Northern Trust Corp now owns 450,873 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $21,430,000 after purchasing an additional 21,609 shares in the last quarter. CW Advisors LLC purchased a new position in POSCO in the first quarter valued at approximately $351,000. Compound Planning Inc. acquired a new stake in POSCO during the first quarter worth approximately $321,000. Finally, Vident Advisory LLC raised its holdings in POSCO by 25.8% during the first quarter. Vident Advisory LLC now owns 45,862 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $2,180,000 after purchasing an additional 9,408 shares in the last quarter.

POSCO Company Profile

POSCO (NYSE: PKX) is a South Korea–based integrated steel producer founded in 1968 as Pohang Iron and Steel Company. Headquartered in Pohang, the company grew rapidly as part of South Korea’s industrialization program and developed large, integrated steelworks—most notably in Pohang and Gwangyang—that helped establish POSCO among the world’s largest steelmakers. It is structured as a diversified industrial group with steelmaking at its core and a range of downstream and trading businesses.

The company’s primary activities include ironmaking and steelmaking, producing a wide array of steel products such as hot-rolled and cold-rolled sheets, coated steels, plates, stainless and special steels, long products (bars and wire rods), and seamless pipes.