Backblaze (NASDAQ:BLZE) Shares Up 5.2% – Still a Buy?

Backblaze, Inc. (NASDAQ:BLZE) traded up 5.2% on Monday. The stock traded as high as $9.23 and last traded at $9.05. Approximately 313,806 shares traded hands during trading, a decline of 85% from the average session volume of 2,089,984 shares. The stock had previously closed at $8.60.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several equities research analysts have weighed in on BLZE shares. Citigroup reissued a “market outperform” rating on shares of Backblaze in a report on Monday, September 14th. Citizens Jmp boosted their price target on Backblaze from $16.00 to $21.00 and gave the company a “market outperform” rating in a research note on Tuesday, August 4th. Weiss Ratings reissued a “sell (e+)” rating on shares of Backblaze in a report on Wednesday, August 12th. William Blair restated a “market perform” rating on shares of Backblaze in a research note on Friday, October 2nd. Finally, Lake Street Capital restated a “buy” rating and issued a $21.00 price objective on shares of Backblaze in a research note on Tuesday, August 4th. Eight research analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating, one has given a Hold rating and one has assigned a Sell rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $19.71.

Backblaze Trading Up 6.0%

The company has a current ratio of 1.00, a quick ratio of 1.00 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.34. The firm has a market cap of $564.40 million, a price-to-earnings ratio of -26.79 and a beta of 1.56. The company has a fifty day moving average price of $14.34 and a 200-day moving average price of $11.14.

Backblaze (NASDAQ:BLZE) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Monday, August 3rd. The company reported $0.08 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.02 by $0.06. Backblaze had a negative return on equity of 16.73% and a negative net margin of 13.07%. The company had revenue of $42.71 million during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $39.94 million. As a group, research analysts expect that Backblaze, Inc. will post -0.28 EPS for the current year.

Insider Buying and Selling at Backblaze

In related news, CEO Gleb Budman sold 12,855 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, August 21st. The stock was sold at an average price of $15.82, for a total value of $203,366.10. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer directly owned 2,192,103 shares in the company, valued at approximately $34,679,069.46. This represents a 0.58% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is accessible through this link. The sale was made to cover tax withholding obligations related to the vesting of equity awards. Also, CFO Marc Suidan sold 2,110 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Friday, August 21st. The shares were sold at an average price of $15.82, for a total value of $33,380.20. Following the completion of the sale, the chief financial officer owned 349,518 shares in the company, valued at $5,529,374.76. This represents a 0.60% decrease in their position. Additional details regarding this sale are available in the official SEC disclosure. The sale was made to cover tax withholding obligations related to the vesting of equity awards. 4.20% of the stock is owned by insiders.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Backblaze

Several hedge funds have recently modified their holdings of BLZE. Allworth Financial LP increased its stake in shares of Backblaze by 83.8% during the second quarter. Allworth Financial LP now owns 1,726 shares of the company’s stock worth $27,000 after acquiring an additional 787 shares during the period. State of Alaska Department of Revenue acquired a new stake in Backblaze in the third quarter valued at about $55,000. Sei Investments Co. acquired a new stake in Backblaze in the first quarter valued at about $60,000. Integrated Wealth Concepts LLC acquired a new stake in Backblaze in the second quarter valued at about $77,000. Finally, R Squared Ltd purchased a new stake in Backblaze in the 1st quarter valued at approximately $84,000. 54.03% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Backblaze Company Profile

Backblaze, Inc provides cloud storage and data backup services for businesses, developers, and individual customers. Its platform is designed to help organizations store, protect, manage, and access data without maintaining their own extensive physical storage infrastructure.

The company’s primary offerings include Backblaze B2 Cloud Storage, an object storage service for applications, backup systems, content delivery, and data-intensive workloads, and Backblaze Computer Backup, which automatically backs up data from computers.