Hays (LON:HAS) Stock Price Down 12.8% – Should You Sell?

Posted by Shane Hupp on Oct 14th, 2026

Shares of Hays plc (LON:HAS – Get Free Report) dropped 12.8% during mid-day trading on Monday. The company traded as low as GBX 56 and last traded at GBX 56. 6,616,393 shares traded hands during mid-day trading, a decline of 50% from the average daily volume of 13,146,817 shares. The stock had previously closed at GBX 64.25.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several equities research analysts recently commented on HAS shares. Jefferies Financial Group reaffirmed an “underperform” rating and issued a GBX 45 price target on shares of Hays in a report on Monday. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft boosted their price objective on Hays from GBX 60 to GBX 95 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Wednesday, September 9th. Citigroup upped their target price on Hays from GBX 33 to GBX 65 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a report on Wednesday, September 23rd. UBS Group restated a “neutral” rating and issued a GBX 33 target price on shares of Hays in a report on Friday, July 3rd. Finally, Royal Bank Of Canada raised their target price on Hays from GBX 60 to GBX 85 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research note on Monday, August 24th. Two research analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating, two have given a Hold rating and one has given a Sell rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of GBX 64.60.

Read Our Latest Stock Report on HAS

Hays Trading Up 2.3%

The stock has a market cap of £899.83 million, a PE ratio of -15.71, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 0.24 and a beta of 0.77. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 60.68, a quick ratio of 1.31 and a current ratio of 1.18. The company’s 50-day moving average price is GBX 66.54 and its 200 day moving average price is GBX 47.75.

Hays (LON:HAS – Get Free Report) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, August 20th. The company reported GBX (3.64) earnings per share for the quarter. Hays had a negative return on equity of 13.31% and a negative net margin of 0.91%. On average, sell-side analysts forecast that Hays plc will post 4.10 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other news, insider James Hilton sold 63,122 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Tuesday, September 8th. The stock was sold at an average price of GBX 67, for a total value of £42,291.74. 0.76% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.