Robert Pittman Acquires 16,349 Shares of iHeartMedia (NASDAQ:IHRT) Stock

iHeartMedia, Inc. (NASDAQ:IHRT) CEO Robert Pittman acquired 16,349 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, March 9th. The stock was acquired at an average cost of $2.97 per share, with a total value of $48,556.53. Following the completion of the acquisition, the chief executive officer directly owned 6,231,286 shares in the company, valued at approximately $18,506,919.42. This represents a 0.26% increase in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this hyperlink.

iHeartMedia Trading Down 6.5%

IHRT traded down $0.21 during trading hours on Monday, hitting $3.03. The company’s stock had a trading volume of 2,400,913 shares, compared to its average volume of 762,470. The company has a 50-day simple moving average of $3.54 and a 200 day simple moving average of $3.43. The firm has a market capitalization of $454.98 million, a PE ratio of -0.99, a PEG ratio of 31.06 and a beta of 1.70. iHeartMedia, Inc. has a fifty-two week low of $0.95 and a fifty-two week high of $5.44.

iHeartMedia (NASDAQ:IHRT) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Monday, March 2nd. The company reported $0.04 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.10 by ($0.06). The business had revenue of $1.12 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.10 billion. iHeartMedia had a negative return on equity of 1.63% and a negative net margin of 12.24%. Research analysts expect that iHeartMedia, Inc. will post -0.13 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Large investors have recently bought and sold shares of the company. AQR Capital Management LLC raised its position in iHeartMedia by 99.8% in the first quarter. AQR Capital Management LLC now owns 2,214,301 shares of the company’s stock worth $3,654,000 after acquiring an additional 1,105,976 shares in the last quarter. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. grew its stake in shares of iHeartMedia by 22.8% in the 1st quarter. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. now owns 2,872,316 shares of the company’s stock worth $4,739,000 after purchasing an additional 532,414 shares during the last quarter. Strs Ohio acquired a new position in shares of iHeartMedia in the 1st quarter worth approximately $186,000. Acadian Asset Management LLC raised its holdings in shares of iHeartMedia by 2.7% in the 2nd quarter. Acadian Asset Management LLC now owns 3,307,000 shares of the company’s stock worth $5,815,000 after purchasing an additional 85,957 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Geode Capital Management LLC lifted its stake in iHeartMedia by 7.1% during the second quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 2,822,306 shares of the company’s stock valued at $4,968,000 after purchasing an additional 186,402 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors own 93.89% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

A number of equities analysts recently issued reports on the stock. The Goldman Sachs Group lowered shares of iHeartMedia from a “neutral” rating to a “sell” rating and decreased their target price for the company from $4.00 to $3.50 in a research report on Friday, January 9th. Weiss Ratings reaffirmed a “sell (d-)” rating on shares of iHeartMedia in a research note on Thursday, January 22nd. Finally, Bank of America increased their price objective on shares of iHeartMedia from $3.00 to $5.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a report on Thursday, November 13th. One analyst has rated the stock with a Buy rating, two have issued a Hold rating and two have assigned a Sell rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, iHeartMedia currently has a consensus rating of “Reduce” and a consensus target price of $4.33.

iHeartMedia Company Profile

iHeartMedia, Inc (NASDAQ: IHRT) is a leading media and entertainment company specializing in radio broadcasting, digital streaming and live events. The company operates more than 860 full-power AM and FM radio stations across the United States, delivering music, news, sports and talk programming to local markets. Through its flagship digital platform, iHeartRadio, the company provides listeners with free and subscription-based access to thousands of live radio stations, curated music playlists and on-demand podcasts.

Originally founded in 1972 as Clear Channel Communications, the business rebranded to iHeartMedia in 2014 to reflect the growing importance of its digital and event-driven offerings.