The Kroger Co. (NYSE:KR) saw an upside of 0.42% to close Monday at $49.70 after adding $0.21 on the day. The 5-day average trading volume is 3,895,520 shares of the company’s common stock. It has gained $50.19 in the past week and touched a new high 5 times within the past 5 days. An average of 3,945,875 shares of the company has been traded in the last 20 days, and the 50-day average volume stands at 5,280,096.
KR’s 1-month performance is 5.36% or $2.53 on its low of $45.92 reached on 07/17/23. The company’s shares have touched a 52-week low of $41.81 and high of $52.00, with the stock’s rally to the 52-week high happening on 05/22/23. YTD, KR has achieved 11.48% or $5.12 and has reached a new high 19 times. However, the current price is down -4.42% from the 52-week high price.
Insider Transactions
KR stock investors last saw insider trading activity on Apr 21.Massa Timothy A (Senior Vice President) most recently sold 23,000 shares at $47.95 per share on Apr 21. This transaction cost the insider $1,102,873. Group Vice President, Wheatley Christine S, sold 25,000 shares at a price of $47.49 on Apr 20. Then, on Apr 06, Senior Vice President Kimball Kenneth C sold 29,024 shares at a price of $48.39 per share. This transaction amounted to $1,404,471.
Valuation Metrics
KR stock has a beta of 0.47. Moving on to other valuation ratios, the trailing price-to-sales (P/S) ratio is 0.24 while the price-to-book (PB) in the most recent quarter is 3.27, with the price to cash flow ratio at 16.34.
The Kroger Co.’s quick ratio for the period ended April 29 was 0.40, with the current ratio over the same period at 0.80. As well, the company’s long term debt to equity for the quarter ending April 29 was 1.11, while the total debt to equity was 1.23. In terms of profitability, the gross margin trailing 12 months is 21.60%. The trailing 12-month EBITDA margin is 5.20% while for the period ending April 29, The Kroger Co.’s operating margin was 2.70%. The firm’s gross profit as reported stood at $31.78 billion against revenue of $148.26 billion.
Earnings Surprise
For the quarterly period ending April 29 this year, Net income and sales went up compared to those figures reported in the previous quarter. Net income grew 30.98% to $962.0 million, while revenue of $451.0 million was 53.12% off the previous quarter. Analysts expected KR to announce $1.46 per share in earnings in its latest quarter, but it posted $1.51, representing a 3.40% surprise. EBITDA for the quarter stood at more than $2.62 billion. KR stock balance sheet for the quarter ending April 29 shows that total liabilities totaled 39.31 billion, with total debt at $20.53 billion. Shareholders hold equity totaling $717.75 million.
Let’s look briefly at The Kroger Co. (KR) price momentum from a technical analysis perspective. The 9-day relative strength index as at close on 07 August was 74.28% to suggest the stock is trending Overbought, with historical volatility in this time period at 10.09%.
The stock’s 5-day moving average is $49.23, reflecting a +2.18% or $1.06 change from its current price. KR is currently trading +6.02% above its 20-day SMA, +5.34% above its 100-day SMA. However, the stock’s current price level is away from the SMA50 by +0.28% and SMA200 by+15.15%.
Stochastic %K and %D was 92.94% and 92.83% and the average true range (ATR) pointed at 0.75. The RSI (14) points at 67.78%, while the 14-day stochastic is at 87.55% with the period’s ATR at 0.77. The stock’s 9-day MACD Oscillator is pointing at 0.63 and 0.93 on the 14-day charts.
Analyst Ratings
In the most recent analyst report for The Kroger Co. (NYSE: KR), Northcoast upgraded it to a Buy rating. They previously had a Neutral rating on the stock. Analysts offering their rating for KR stock have a consensus rating for the stock as Overweight. Currently, 1 brokerage advisors rate KR as a “sell,”, while 10 advise that investors “Hold.” 0 analysts have rated the stock as underweight. 2 rates the stock as overweight while 9 have offered a “buy” rating.
What is KR’s price target for the next 12 months?
Analysts have a consensus price target ranging from a low of $42.00 and a high of $65.00, with their median price target at $52.00. Looking at these predictions, the average price target given by analysts is for The Kroger Co. (KR) stock is $51.82.
