Viking Therapeutics (NASDAQ:VKTX) Releases Quarterly Earnings Results, Beats Expectations By $0.01 EPS

Viking Therapeutics (NASDAQ:VKTX) issued its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday. The biotechnology company reported ($0.26) earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of ($0.27) by $0.01, Briefing.com reports. During the same period last year, the company earned ($0.25) EPS.

Viking Therapeutics Trading Up 3.3 %

NASDAQ:VKTX traded up $2.17 on Thursday, reaching $67.24. The stock had a trading volume of 2,075,527 shares, compared to its average volume of 5,607,273. Viking Therapeutics has a 12-month low of $8.28 and a 12-month high of $99.41. The stock has a market cap of $7.41 billion, a P/E ratio of -73.18 and a beta of 1.05. The company has a 50-day moving average of $66.95 and a 200 day moving average of $34.33.

Insider Buying and Selling

In related news, CEO Brian Lian sold 269,079 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Thursday, February 8th. The shares were sold at an average price of $26.87, for a total value of $7,230,152.73. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 2,184,882 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $58,707,779.34. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this hyperlink. In other Viking Therapeutics news, CEO Brian Lian sold 269,079 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Thursday, February 8th. The shares were sold at an average price of $26.87, for a total transaction of $7,230,152.73. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 2,184,882 shares in the company, valued at $58,707,779.34. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through the SEC website. Also, Director Sarah Kathryn Rouan sold 25,000 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Thursday, February 8th. The shares were sold at an average price of $28.05, for a total transaction of $701,250.00. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last 90 days, insiders have sold 329,079 shares of company stock worth $8,769,653. 4.70% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

VKTX has been the topic of a number of analyst reports. Stifel Nicolaus restated a “buy” rating and issued a $80.00 price target on shares of Viking Therapeutics in a research note on Friday, March 15th. Raymond James upped their price target on shares of Viking Therapeutics from $37.00 to $115.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research report on Tuesday, February 27th. StockNews.com upgraded Viking Therapeutics to a “sell” rating in a report on Thursday. Truist Financial upped their price target on Viking Therapeutics from $32.00 to $120.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Thursday, February 29th. Finally, Maxim Group reissued a “buy” rating and issued a $120.00 price objective on shares of Viking Therapeutics in a research report on Friday, March 15th. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating and ten have given a buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $112.25.

Viking Therapeutics Company Profile

Viking Therapeutics, Inc, a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company, focuses on the development of novel therapies for metabolic and endocrine disorders. The company's lead drug candidate is VK2809, an orally available tissue and receptor-subtype selective agonist of the thyroid hormone receptor beta (TRß), which is in Phase IIb clinical trials to treat patients with biopsy-confirmed non-alcoholic steatohepatitis, as well as NAFLD.