VeriSign, Inc. (NASDAQ:VRSN) Stock Has Consensus Price Target of $333.00

VeriSign, Inc. (NASDAQ:VRSN) has earned an average recommendation of “Moderate Buy” from the six analysts that are currently covering the company, Marketbeat.com reports. Two research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and four have given a buy rating to the company. The average twelve-month price target among brokerages that have covered the stock in the last year is $333.00.

A number of analysts have commented on VRSN shares. JPMorgan Chase & Co. boosted their price target on VeriSign from $308.00 to $316.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research note on Friday, July 24th. Wedbush increased their price objective on VeriSign from $324.00 to $341.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research report on Tuesday, September 1st. Zacks Research downgraded VeriSign from a “strong-buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a report on Wednesday, September 23rd. Finally, Weiss Ratings reissued a “buy (b-)” rating on shares of VeriSign in a research report on Monday, September 21st.

Insider Buying and Selling at VeriSign

In related news, CEO D. Bidzos sold 3,300 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, July 28th. The shares were sold at an average price of $281.20, for a total transaction of $927,960.00. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer owned 412,939 shares in the company, valued at $116,118,446.80. This represents a 0.79% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed 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. Insiders have sold 36,750 shares of company stock worth $10,552,696 over the last three months. 0.56% of the stock is owned by insiders.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On VeriSign

Large investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the stock. Fifth Third Bancorp boosted its stake in VeriSign by 208.5% during the first quarter. Fifth Third Bancorp now owns 13,385 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $3,324,000 after buying an additional 9,046 shares during the last quarter. BlackRock Inc. purchased a new stake in shares of VeriSign during the 2nd quarter worth approximately $2,116,154,000. Callan Family Office LLC bought a new position in shares of VeriSign during the 2nd quarter valued at approximately $944,000. Barclays PLC boosted its position in shares of VeriSign by 40.4% during the 4th quarter. Barclays PLC now owns 454,292 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $110,370,000 after acquiring an additional 130,683 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Westpac Banking Corp grew its holdings in shares of VeriSign by 149.8% in the fourth quarter. Westpac Banking Corp now owns 9,382 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $2,279,000 after purchasing an additional 5,626 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors own 92.90% of the company’s stock.

VeriSign Stock Performance

Shares of NASDAQ VRSN opened at $292.26 on Tuesday. The firm’s 50 day moving average price is $289.87 and its 200-day moving average price is $278.49. VeriSign has a 52-week low of $208.86 and a 52-week high of $312.48. The company has a market cap of $26.39 billion, a PE ratio of 31.70 and a beta of 0.69.

VeriSign (NASDAQ:VRSN) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, July 23rd. The information services provider reported $2.38 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $2.36 by $0.02. The company had revenue of $434.60 million during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $433.19 million. VeriSign had a net margin of 49.76% and a negative return on equity of 39.20%. The firm’s quarterly revenue was up 6.0% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter last year, the firm earned $2.21 earnings per share. On average, analysts forecast that VeriSign will post 9.59 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

VeriSign Dividend Announcement

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Thursday, August 27th. Stockholders of record on Wednesday, August 19th were paid a $0.81 dividend. The ex-dividend date was Wednesday, August 19th. This represents a $3.24 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 1.1%. VeriSign’s payout ratio is currently 35.14%.

About VeriSign

VeriSign, Inc (NASDAQ:VRSN) provides critical internet infrastructure and domain name registry services. The company operates the authoritative registries for the .com and .net top-level domains and supports the security, stability and availability of these domains worldwide. VeriSign also operates the .name and .cc registries and provides backend registry services for additional top-level domains.

In addition to registry operations, VeriSign offers domain name system (DNS) services designed to help organizations maintain reliable online access.