Upstart (NASDAQ:UPST) Announces Share Repurchase Plan

Upstart (NASDAQ:UPST) announced that its board has authorized a share buyback program on Thursday, February 19th, RTT News reports. The company plans to repurchase $100.00 million in shares. This repurchase authorization allows the company to repurchase up to 3.2% of its shares through open market purchases. Shares repurchase programs are typically an indication that the company’s board of directors believes its shares are undervalued.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

A number of research analysts have commented on UPST shares. Zacks Research downgraded shares of Upstart from a “hold” rating to a “strong sell” rating in a research report on Tuesday. JPMorgan Chase & Co. dropped their price objective on shares of Upstart from $88.00 to $65.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a research note on Wednesday, November 5th. Weiss Ratings reissued a “sell (d+)” rating on shares of Upstart in a report on Monday, December 29th. Needham & Company LLC reissued a “buy” rating and issued a $56.00 price objective on shares of Upstart in a research note on Wednesday, February 11th. Finally, Truist Financial lowered their target price on Upstart from $59.00 to $49.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a report on Wednesday, February 11th. Four analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating, seven have issued a Hold rating and four have assigned a Sell rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $49.50.

Upstart Stock Performance

UPST traded down $0.88 during trading on Thursday, hitting $30.65. The stock had a trading volume of 6,397,770 shares, compared to its average volume of 5,462,483. The stock has a 50 day simple moving average of $43.30 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $50.85. Upstart has a twelve month low of $29.60 and a twelve month high of $87.30. The company has a market capitalization of $3.01 billion, a PE ratio of 72.98, a PEG ratio of 0.82 and a beta of 2.38.

Upstart (NASDAQ:UPST) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, February 10th. The company reported $0.17 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.15 by $0.02. The firm had revenue of $296.09 million during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $288.54 million. Upstart had a return on equity of 6.30% and a net margin of 5.13%.The business’s revenue for the quarter was up 35.2% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the prior year, the business posted $0.26 EPS. On average, equities research analysts anticipate that Upstart will post -0.03 EPS for the current year.

Insider Transactions at Upstart

In related news, Director Kerry Whorton Cooper sold 1,500 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, December 12th. The shares were sold at an average price of $50.00, for a total value of $75,000.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the director directly owned 23,934 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $1,196,700. This trade represents a 5.90% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available through this hyperlink. Also, insider Natalia Mirgorodskaya sold 762 shares of Upstart stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, November 25th. The stock was sold at an average price of $38.91, for a total transaction of $29,649.42. Following the completion of the sale, the insider owned 26,398 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $1,027,146.18. This trade represents a 2.81% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale is available in the SEC filing. Company insiders own 16.67% of the company’s stock.

About Upstart

Upstart Holdings, Inc operates a cloud-based lending marketplace that leverages artificial intelligence and machine learning to assess borrower creditworthiness. The company partners with banks and credit unions, providing its proprietary AI models and underwriting platform to facilitate consumer credit products. By focusing on non‐traditional data points—such as education, employment history and other real‐time indicators—Upstart seeks to improve approval rates and lower loss rates compared with conventional credit scoring methods.

Upstart’s core offering centers on unsecured personal loans, which borrowers can use for purposes such as debt consolidation, home improvements or major purchases.