Meritage Homes (NYSE:MTH) Raised to Hold at Zacks Research

Meritage Homes (NYSE:MTH) was upgraded by equities research analysts at Zacks Research from a “strong sell” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note issued on Monday,Zacks.com reports.

Other analysts have also recently issued research reports about the company. Truist Financial set a $80.00 target price on Meritage Homes and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Thursday, April 16th. Bank of America cut their price target on Meritage Homes from $74.00 to $72.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a report on Monday, April 20th. Zelman & Associates downgraded shares of Meritage Homes from an “outperform” rating to a “neutral” rating in a research report on Tuesday, July 7th. Wall Street Zen lowered shares of Meritage Homes from a “hold” rating to a “sell” rating in a report on Saturday, June 20th. Finally, The Goldman Sachs Group restated a “buy” rating and issued a $93.00 price objective (up from $82.00) on shares of Meritage Homes in a research report on Friday. Five investment analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and eight have issued a Hold rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $80.22.

Meritage Homes Stock Performance

NYSE MTH opened at $73.48 on Monday. The firm has a market cap of $4.90 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 13.48, a PEG ratio of 3.29 and a beta of 1.35. The company has a 50 day moving average of $71.19 and a 200-day moving average of $70.05. The company has a current ratio of 1.96, a quick ratio of 1.96 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.36. Meritage Homes has a 1-year low of $58.03 and a 1-year high of $85.38.

Meritage Homes (NYSE:MTH) last announced its earnings results on Wednesday, April 22nd. The construction company reported $0.86 EPS for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $0.98 by ($0.12). The business had revenue of $1.12 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.55 billion. Meritage Homes had a return on equity of 8.08% and a net margin of 6.86%.The firm’s revenue was down 17.5% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the previous year, the firm earned $1.69 earnings per share. On average, equities analysts forecast that Meritage Homes will post 4.97 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Meritage Homes news, CAO Alison Sasser sold 1,273 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, May 12th. The shares were sold at an average price of $62.11, for a total transaction of $79,066.03. Following the transaction, the chief accounting officer directly owned 7,634 shares in the company, valued at approximately $474,147.74. This represents a 14.29% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is accessible through this hyperlink. Corporate insiders own 2.50% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Meritage Homes

A number of institutional investors and hedge funds have recently modified their holdings of the business. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP boosted its stake in Meritage Homes by 0.6% in the fourth quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP now owns 2,901,851 shares of the construction company’s stock valued at $190,943,000 after acquiring an additional 16,338 shares during the last quarter. Greenhaven Associates Inc. raised its position in shares of Meritage Homes by 0.9% during the 4th quarter. Greenhaven Associates Inc. now owns 1,465,340 shares of the construction company’s stock valued at $96,419,000 after acquiring an additional 12,386 shares during the last quarter. Balyasny Asset Management L.P. lifted its stake in shares of Meritage Homes by 58.9% in the 2nd quarter. Balyasny Asset Management L.P. now owns 1,423,013 shares of the construction company’s stock valued at $95,299,000 after purchasing an additional 527,265 shares during the period. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. boosted its position in shares of Meritage Homes by 58.6% in the 1st quarter. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. now owns 1,058,850 shares of the construction company’s stock worth $75,051,000 after purchasing an additional 391,297 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Norges Bank bought a new position in shares of Meritage Homes in the 4th quarter worth $63,053,000. 98.44% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

About Meritage Homes

Meritage Homes Corporation is a national homebuilder and residential developer headquartered in Scottsdale, Arizona. Founded in 1985 as Winchester Homes and later rebranded to Meritage Homes, the company specializes in designing, constructing and selling single?family detached and attached homes. With a focus on energy efficiency and sustainable building practices, Meritage Homes markets its properties under the GreenSmart program, which integrates high?performance features aimed at reducing long?term energy and water consumption for homebuyers.

The company’s core activities encompass land acquisition, residential community planning, home design, construction management and real estate sales.