67,582 Shares in Cognex Corporation $CGNX Purchased by Rice Hall James & Associates LLC

Rice Hall James & Associates LLC bought a new stake in Cognex Corporation (NASDAQ:CGNX) during the second quarter, HoldingsChannel reports. The fund bought 67,582 shares of the scientific and technical instruments company’s stock, valued at approximately $4,894,000.

Other hedge funds and other institutional investors also recently bought and sold shares of the company. Mitsubishi UFJ Asset Management Co. Ltd. acquired a new stake in Cognex during the 2nd quarter valued at approximately $26,000. Geneos Wealth Management Inc. increased its stake in shares of Cognex by 402.2% in the first quarter. Geneos Wealth Management Inc. now owns 919 shares of the scientific and technical instruments company’s stock worth $27,000 after acquiring an additional 736 shares during the period. Elevation Wealth Partners LLC increased its stake in shares of Cognex by 635.4% in the second quarter. Elevation Wealth Partners LLC now owns 478 shares of the scientific and technical instruments company’s stock worth $35,000 after acquiring an additional 413 shares during the period. CIBC Private Wealth Group LLC increased its stake in shares of Cognex by 74.8% in the third quarter. CIBC Private Wealth Group LLC now owns 764 shares of the scientific and technical instruments company’s stock worth $35,000 after acquiring an additional 327 shares during the period. Finally, Cassaday & Co Wealth Management LLC purchased a new position in shares of Cognex during the first quarter worth $36,000. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 88.12% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of research analysts recently issued reports on the stock. Zacks Research upgraded shares of Cognex from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Tuesday, June 16th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. raised Cognex from a “neutral” rating to an “overweight” rating and increased their price target for the stock from $65.00 to $75.00 in a research report on Tuesday, May 26th. UBS Group set a $75.00 price objective on Cognex in a report on Tuesday, May 26th. HSBC downgraded Cognex from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating and set a $65.00 target price on the stock. in a research note on Monday, August 10th. Finally, Weiss Ratings raised Cognex from a “hold (c)” rating to a “hold (c+)” rating in a report on Tuesday, August 11th. Two investment analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, ten have assigned a Buy rating and five have issued a Hold rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat.com, Cognex has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $75.64.

Cognex Price Performance

CGNX opened at $66.60 on Tuesday. The firm has a fifty day moving average price of $64.95 and a 200 day moving average price of $58.27. Cognex Corporation has a 1 year low of $34.60 and a 1 year high of $72.88. The stock has a market cap of $11.20 billion, a P/E ratio of 64.66 and a beta of 1.49.

Cognex (NASDAQ:CGNX) last released its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, August 5th. The scientific and technical instruments company reported $0.45 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.42 by $0.03. Cognex had a net margin of 16.05% and a return on equity of 13.50%. The company had revenue of $291.26 million for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $292.10 million. During the same quarter last year, the business earned $0.25 earnings per share. The firm’s revenue was up 16.9% on a year-over-year basis. Cognex has set its FY 2026 guidance at 1.640-1.680 EPS and its Q3 2026 guidance at 0.500-0.540 EPS. Equities analysts expect that Cognex Corporation will post 1.68 EPS for the current year.

Cognex Dividend Announcement

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, September 3rd. Stockholders of record on Thursday, August 20th will be paid a dividend of $0.085 per share. This represents a $0.34 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.5%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, August 20th. Cognex’s dividend payout ratio is presently 33.01%.

Insider Activity at Cognex

In other news, VP Darren Marc Long sold 20,252 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, May 27th. The stock was sold at an average price of $66.34, for a total transaction of $1,343,517.68. Following the sale, the vice president directly owned 3,990 shares in the company, valued at $264,696.60. This trade represents a 83.54% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at the SEC website. 1.70% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

About Cognex

Cognex Corporation is a leading provider of machine vision systems, software, sensors and industrial barcode readers used to automate manufacturing, logistics and distribution processes. The company designs and develops vision-based products that help manufacturers and logistics operators inspect, identify and guide parts, assemblies and packaged goods in real time. Its solutions are applied in a broad range of industries, including automotive, electronics, semiconductor, pharmaceutical, food and beverage, and general manufacturing.

The company’s product portfolio includes stand-alone vision systems, vision sensors and deep learning-based software platforms that enable automated inspection, quality control and traceability.