Campbell & CO Investment Adviser LLC Purchases Shares of 26,168 BJ’s Restaurants, Inc. $BJRI

Campbell & CO Investment Adviser LLC acquired a new stake in BJ’s Restaurants, Inc. (NASDAQ:BJRI) during the 2nd quarter, according to its most recent 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The fund acquired 26,168 shares of the restaurant operator’s stock, valued at approximately $1,167,000.

Other institutional investors have also recently made changes to their positions in the company. Summit Securities Group LLC bought a new stake in shares of BJ’s Restaurants during the first quarter valued at approximately $69,000. US Bancorp DE grew its stake in BJ’s Restaurants by 51.8% during the first quarter. US Bancorp DE now owns 2,887 shares of the restaurant operator’s stock valued at $99,000 after acquiring an additional 985 shares in the last quarter. Headlands Technologies LLC lifted its stake in BJ’s Restaurants by 12.0% in the 1st quarter. Headlands Technologies LLC now owns 3,438 shares of the restaurant operator’s stock worth $118,000 after purchasing an additional 369 shares in the last quarter. AdvisorShares Investments LLC bought a new position in shares of BJ’s Restaurants during the 2nd quarter valued at about $120,000. Finally, Longboard Asset Management LP purchased a new position in shares of BJ’s Restaurants during the second quarter valued at about $203,000. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 99.95% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of research firms recently commented on BJRI. Zacks Research downgraded BJ’s Restaurants from a “strong-buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Monday, October 13th. Barclays upped their price objective on BJ’s Restaurants from $28.00 to $30.00 and gave the stock an “underweight” rating in a report on Friday, October 31st. Weiss Ratings cut shares of BJ’s Restaurants from a “hold (c)” rating to a “sell (d+)” rating in a research report on Friday, November 7th. Mizuho raised shares of BJ’s Restaurants to a “hold” rating in a research note on Tuesday, October 28th. Finally, Jefferies Financial Group reissued a “buy” rating and issued a $50.00 price objective on shares of BJ’s Restaurants in a research note on Friday, October 31st. Three investment analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating, five have issued a Hold rating and three have assigned a Sell rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, BJ’s Restaurants presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $38.75.

Insider Activity

In other news, VP Alex Puchner sold 1,821 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, September 8th. The stock was sold at an average price of $34.06, for a total value of $62,023.26. Following the sale, the vice president directly owned 10,622 shares in the company, valued at approximately $361,785.32. This represents a 14.63% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through the SEC website. Also, CAO Jacob Guild sold 9,521 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, August 19th. The stock was sold at an average price of $35.51, for a total value of $338,090.71. Following the sale, the chief accounting officer directly owned 3,803 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $135,044.53. This represents a 71.46% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale is available in the SEC filing. Over the last 90 days, insiders have sold 15,458 shares of company stock valued at $545,656. 4.30% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.

BJ’s Restaurants Price Performance

BJ’s Restaurants stock opened at $36.80 on Thursday. The firm has a 50-day moving average price of $31.93 and a 200-day moving average price of $37.18. The firm has a market capitalization of $777.77 million, a PE ratio of 30.92, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.01 and a beta of 1.35. The company has a current ratio of 0.38, a quick ratio of 0.32 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.16. BJ’s Restaurants, Inc. has a 12-month low of $28.46 and a 12-month high of $47.02.

BJ’s Restaurants (NASDAQ:BJRI) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, October 30th. The restaurant operator reported $0.04 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of ($0.01) by $0.05. BJ’s Restaurants had a net margin of 1.99% and a return on equity of 11.73%. The company had revenue of $330.16 million for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $335.86 million. During the same period in the prior year, the firm posted ($0.13) EPS. The firm’s revenue was up 1.4% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, equities research analysts forecast that BJ’s Restaurants, Inc. will post 1.5 EPS for the current year.

BJ’s Restaurants declared that its board has approved a share buyback program on Thursday, October 30th that authorizes the company to repurchase $75.00 million in outstanding shares. This repurchase authorization authorizes the restaurant operator to purchase up to 11.3% of its stock through open market purchases. Stock repurchase programs are usually an indication that the company’s management believes its stock is undervalued.

BJ’s Restaurants Profile

BJ’s Restaurants, Inc owns and operates casual dining restaurants in the United States. Its restaurants offer pizzas, craft and other beers, appetizers, entrées, pastas, sandwiches, specialty salads, and desserts under brand name Pizookie. The company was formerly known as Chicago Pizza & Brewery, Inc and changed its name to BJ’s Restaurants, Inc in August 2004.