Thomas Kelly Sells 7,000 Shares of Monster Beverage (NASDAQ:MNST) Stock

Monster Beverage Corporation (NASDAQ:MNST) CFO Thomas Kelly sold 7,000 shares of Monster Beverage stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, May 13th. The shares were sold at an average price of $87.81, for a total value of $614,670.00. Following the transaction, the chief financial officer directly owned 62,553 shares in the company, valued at approximately $5,492,778.93. This trade represents a 10.06% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through the SEC website.

Monster Beverage Trading Up 1.5%

NASDAQ:MNST traded up $1.27 on Friday, hitting $87.09. 6,147,721 shares of the company’s stock traded hands, compared to its average volume of 5,841,254. Monster Beverage Corporation has a 1 year low of $58.09 and a 1 year high of $88.77. The firm has a 50-day moving average price of $76.38 and a 200-day moving average price of $76.52. The company has a market cap of $85.17 billion, a PE ratio of 42.07, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.83 and a beta of 0.50.

Monster Beverage (NASDAQ:MNST) last released its earnings results on Friday, May 8th. The company reported $0.58 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.53 by $0.05. Monster Beverage had a return on equity of 26.86% and a net margin of 23.11%.The company had revenue of $2.32 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $2.16 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the business posted $0.47 EPS. The business’s revenue for the quarter was up 22.6% on a year-over-year basis. On average, research analysts forecast that Monster Beverage Corporation will post 2.31 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

MNST has been the topic of several research analyst reports. Wall Street Zen cut Monster Beverage from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Monday, March 9th. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft boosted their price target on Monster Beverage from $88.00 to $94.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Friday, May 8th. Stifel Nicolaus lowered their price target on Monster Beverage from $92.00 to $90.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research note on Thursday, April 23rd. Bank of America lowered their price target on Monster Beverage from $100.00 to $96.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research note on Friday, April 10th. Finally, BNP Paribas Exane raised Monster Beverage from an “underperform” rating to a “neutral” rating and set a $77.00 price target for the company in a research note on Friday, January 16th. Fourteen analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and seven have given a Hold rating to the company. According to MarketBeat.com, the company currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $88.37.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Monster Beverage

Several large investors have recently made changes to their positions in the company. Vanguard Group Inc. grew its stake in shares of Monster Beverage by 0.7% in the 4th quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 67,980,692 shares of the company’s stock valued at $5,212,080,000 after buying an additional 497,108 shares in the last quarter. State Street Corp boosted its position in Monster Beverage by 0.8% during the fourth quarter. State Street Corp now owns 38,021,648 shares of the company’s stock worth $2,915,120,000 after purchasing an additional 302,557 shares during the period. Geode Capital Management LLC boosted its position in Monster Beverage by 1.7% during the fourth quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 19,625,097 shares of the company’s stock worth $1,509,369,000 after purchasing an additional 330,766 shares during the period. Invesco Ltd. boosted its position in Monster Beverage by 6.3% during the third quarter. Invesco Ltd. now owns 11,675,603 shares of the company’s stock worth $785,885,000 after purchasing an additional 692,192 shares during the period. Finally, Schroder Investment Management Group boosted its position in Monster Beverage by 18.4% during the fourth quarter. Schroder Investment Management Group now owns 9,676,260 shares of the company’s stock worth $741,879,000 after purchasing an additional 1,500,577 shares during the period. Institutional investors own 72.36% of the company’s stock.

About Monster Beverage

Monster Beverage Corporation (NASDAQ: MNST) is an American beverage company best known for its Monster Energy brand of energy drinks. The company’s product portfolio centers on carbonated energy beverages and a range of complementary ready-to-drink offerings, including energy coffees, hydration beverages and other flavored functional drinks. Monster markets multiple sub-brands and flavor variants to address different consumer segments and consumption occasions.

Originally organized around the Hansen’s Natural line of juices and sodas, the company pivoted toward the energy drink category and formally adopted the Monster Beverage name in the early 2010s to reflect its strategic focus.