Duolingo, Inc. $DUOL Position Cut by Sands Capital Management LLC

Sands Capital Management LLC trimmed its stake in Duolingo, Inc. (NASDAQ:DUOL) by 16.1% during the fourth quarter, HoldingsChannel.com reports. The institutional investor owned 39,975 shares of the company’s stock after selling 7,697 shares during the quarter. Sands Capital Management LLC’s holdings in Duolingo were worth $7,016,000 as of its most recent filing with the SEC.

A number of other hedge funds also recently added to or reduced their stakes in DUOL. Baillie Gifford & Co. lifted its stake in Duolingo by 71.9% in the fourth quarter. Baillie Gifford & Co. now owns 4,861,445 shares of the company’s stock valued at $853,184,000 after buying an additional 2,033,611 shares during the last quarter. State of Michigan Retirement System lifted its stake in Duolingo by 5,800.0% in the fourth quarter. State of Michigan Retirement System now owns 560,500 shares of the company’s stock valued at $98,368,000 after buying an additional 551,000 shares during the last quarter. Norges Bank bought a new stake in Duolingo in the fourth quarter valued at $86,159,000. Balyasny Asset Management L.P. lifted its stake in Duolingo by 22,970.4% in the third quarter. Balyasny Asset Management L.P. now owns 415,268 shares of the company’s stock valued at $133,650,000 after buying an additional 413,468 shares during the last quarter. Finally, AQR Capital Management LLC lifted its stake in Duolingo by 78.4% in the third quarter. AQR Capital Management LLC now owns 740,869 shares of the company’s stock valued at $238,441,000 after buying an additional 325,648 shares during the last quarter. 91.59% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Analyst Ratings Changes

DUOL has been the topic of a number of recent research reports. Truist Financial cut Duolingo from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating and set a $100.00 target price on the stock. in a research note on Friday, February 27th. KeyCorp reissued a “sector weight” rating on shares of Duolingo in a report on Thursday, June 4th. The Goldman Sachs Group lowered their price target on Duolingo from $250.00 to $105.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a report on Monday, March 2nd. Weiss Ratings lowered Duolingo from a “hold (c-)” rating to a “sell (d+)” rating in a report on Wednesday, April 22nd. Finally, Citigroup reissued a “neutral” rating and set a $101.00 price target (down from $270.00) on shares of Duolingo in a report on Friday, February 27th. Three equities research analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating, seventeen have assigned a Hold rating and two have given a Sell rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, the stock presently has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $197.61.

Insider Buying and Selling

In related news, insider Natalie Glance sold 3,360 shares of Duolingo stock in a transaction dated Monday, May 18th. The stock was sold at an average price of $113.59, for a total transaction of $381,662.40. Following the transaction, the insider directly owned 173,401 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $19,696,619.59. The trade was a 1.90% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at the SEC website. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. The sale was made to cover tax withholding obligations related to the vesting of equity awards. Also, insider Robert Meese sold 1,420 shares of Duolingo stock in a transaction dated Friday, May 15th. The stock was sold at an average price of $112.16, for a total value of $159,267.20. Following the transaction, the insider directly owned 170,745 shares in the company, valued at approximately $19,150,759.20. The trade was a 0.82% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale is available in the SEC filing. The sale was made to cover tax withholding obligations related to the vesting of equity awards. Insiders have sold a total of 9,506 shares of company stock valued at $1,073,864 over the last three months. Company insiders own 16.62% of the company’s stock.

Duolingo Price Performance

Shares of DUOL opened at $122.63 on Monday. The firm has a market capitalization of $5.71 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 14.11, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 0.93 and a beta of 0.89. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.07, a quick ratio of 2.62 and a current ratio of 2.62. Duolingo, Inc. has a one year low of $87.89 and a one year high of $489.00. The stock’s fifty day moving average is $106.08 and its 200-day moving average is $129.74.

Duolingo (NASDAQ:DUOL) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Monday, May 4th. The company reported $0.89 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.79 by $0.10. The company had revenue of $291.97 million for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $288.60 million. Duolingo had a return on equity of 14.07% and a net margin of 38.44%.The company’s quarterly revenue was up 26.5% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period last year, the company earned $0.72 earnings per share. Equities analysts anticipate that Duolingo, Inc. will post 2.84 EPS for the current year.

Duolingo Company Profile

Duolingo, Inc (NASDAQ:DUOL) is a technology-driven education company that operates a widely used language-learning platform. Founded in 2011 by Luis von Ahn and Severin Hacker, Duolingo offers a freemium service featuring bite-sized lessons, gamified exercises and adaptive learning algorithms. The company’s core product is its mobile and web application, which supports instruction in more than 40 languages, ranging from widely spoken tongues such as English and Spanish to lesser-taught options including Irish and Swahili.

In addition to its flagship language courses, Duolingo has expanded its product suite to include the Duolingo English Test, an on-demand, computer-based English proficiency exam designed for academic and professional admissions.