Generac Holdings Inc. (NYSE:GNRC) Sees Large Decline in Short Interest

Generac Holdings Inc. (NYSE:GNRC) was the recipient of a large decrease in short interest during the month of March. As of March 31st, there was short interest totalling 3,480,000 shares, a decrease of 6.5% from the March 15th total of 3,720,000 shares. Currently, 5.9% of the shares of the company are short sold. Based on an average daily volume of 1,040,000 shares, the days-to-cover ratio is presently 3.3 days.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

GNRC has been the subject of a number of recent research reports. Canaccord Genuity Group boosted their price objective on Generac from $140.00 to $150.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Friday, April 5th. Robert W. Baird boosted their price objective on Generac from $112.00 to $129.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Thursday, February 15th. UBS Group cut their price objective on Generac from $160.00 to $150.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research note on Thursday, February 15th. Roth Mkm upped their price target on Generac from $105.00 to $118.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research note on Tuesday, February 6th. Finally, TD Cowen dropped their price target on Generac from $165.00 to $144.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a research note on Thursday, February 15th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, eight have assigned a hold rating and fifteen have issued a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat.com, Generac has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $140.80.

Insider Activity

In related news, CEO Aaron Jagdfeld sold 5,000 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, April 1st. The stock was sold at an average price of $126.94, for a total transaction of $634,700.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer now directly owns 592,177 shares in the company, valued at approximately $75,170,948.38. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available at this hyperlink. Insiders own 2.80% of the company’s stock.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On Generac

Several institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in the company. Fairfield Bush & CO. boosted its position in Generac by 83.2% during the first quarter. Fairfield Bush & CO. now owns 7,102 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $2,111,000 after purchasing an additional 3,225 shares in the last quarter. Commonwealth of Pennsylvania Public School Empls Retrmt SYS boosted its holdings in Generac by 6.6% in the first quarter. Commonwealth of Pennsylvania Public School Empls Retrmt SYS now owns 8,442 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $2,509,000 after acquiring an additional 523 shares in the last quarter. Prudential PLC acquired a new stake in Generac in the first quarter worth about $441,000. National Pension Service boosted its holdings in Generac by 12.8% in the first quarter. National Pension Service now owns 98,555 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $29,296,000 after acquiring an additional 11,158 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Vanguard Group Inc. boosted its holdings in Generac by 2.0% in the first quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 6,770,488 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $2,012,595,000 after acquiring an additional 130,854 shares in the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 84.04% of the company’s stock.

Generac Price Performance

Shares of NYSE GNRC traded up $0.24 during midday trading on Wednesday, reaching $129.34. 557,334 shares of the stock traded hands, compared to its average volume of 1,012,547. The company’s 50 day moving average is $120.60 and its 200 day moving average is $115.29. Generac has a one year low of $79.86 and a one year high of $156.95. The stock has a market capitalization of $7.80 billion, a PE ratio of 39.24, a P/E/G ratio of 1.70 and a beta of 1.45. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.62, a current ratio of 2.27 and a quick ratio of 0.94.

Generac (NYSE:GNRC) last released its earnings results on Wednesday, February 14th. The technology company reported $2.07 earnings per share for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.09 by ($0.02). Generac had a return on equity of 14.15% and a net margin of 5.33%. The business had revenue of $1.06 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $1.09 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the business earned $1.78 EPS. The business’s revenue for the quarter was up 1.4% on a year-over-year basis. On average, equities research analysts anticipate that Generac will post 6.3 earnings per share for the current year.

About Generac

Generac Holdings Inc designs, manufactures, and distributes various energy technology products and solution worldwide. The company offers residential automatic standby generators, automatic transfer switch, air-cooled engine residential standby generators, and liquid-cooled engine generators; Mobile Link, a remote monitoring system for home standby generators; residential storage solution, which consists of a system of batteries, an inverter, photovoltaic optimizers, power electronic controls, and other components; smart home solutions, such as smart thermostats and a suite of home monitoring products.