Costco Wholesale Corporation (NASDAQ:COST) finished Thursday with an addition of $1.47 to close at $533.18, an upside of 0.28 percent. An average of 1,344,219 shares of common stock have been traded in the last five days. There was a fall of -$12.28 in the past week, and it reached a new high 10 times over the past 12 months. The last 20 days have seen an average of 1,348,245 shares traded, while the 50-day average volume stands at 1,611,266.
COST stock has decreased by -5.10% in the last month. The company shares reached their 1-month lowest point of $530.82 on 08/24/23. With the stock rallying to its 52-week high on 07/27/23, shares of the company touched a low of $447.90 and a high of $571.16 in 52 weeks. It has reached a new high 27 times so far this year and achieved 16.80% or $76.16 in price. In spite of this, the price is down -6.65% from the 52-week high.
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Insider Transactions
COST stock investors should be aware that Costco Wholesale Corporation (COST) stock had its last reported insider trading activity 58 days ago on Jun 28. In this transaction, the insider spent $834,145. Executive VP and CFO, GALANTI RICHARD A, disposed of 1,500 shares at a price of $522.02 on Jun 13. The insider now owns more than $783,038 worth of shares. Prior to that, Director DECKER SUSAN L went on to Sale 3,971 shares at $514.14 each on Jun 07. An amount of $2,041,659 was transacted.
Valuation Metrics
Costco Wholesale Corporation (COST) has a trailing price-to-earnings (P/E) ratio of 39.50. The stock’s beta is 0.79. Other valuation ratios to consider include the trailing price-to-sales (P/S) ratio at 1.01, the price-to-book (PB) ratio at 10.04, and the price-to-cash flow ratio at 40.74.
The company has a payout ratio of 26.60%. The company’s most recent quarterly dividend payment was $1.02 a share, without any change from last year. Its latest increase dividend $0.12 reported on Wednesday April 19 2023.
Financial Health
The quick ratio of Costco Wholesale Corporation for the three months ended May 30 was 0.60, and the current ratio was 1.10, indicating that the company is not able to meet its debt obligations. Further, the company has a long term debt to equity ratio of 0.28 and a total debt to equity ratio of 0.28 for the quarter ending May 30. Its gross profit as reported stood at $27.57 billion compared to revenue of $226.95 billion.
Earnings Surprise
For the three-month period that ended May 30, Costco Wholesale Corporation had $6.5 billion in total debt. In the quarter under review, the net income was down than the previous quarter. The company posted a net income of $1.3 billion in the quarter, while revenues of $1.47 billion were shrunk -3.92%. The analyst consensus anticipated Costco Wholesale Corporation’s latest quarter earnings to come in at $3.29 per share, but it turned out to be $2.93, a -10.90% surprise. For the quarter, EBITDA amounted to $2.15 billion. Shareholders own equity worth $443.15 million.
Technical Picture
From a technical analysis perspective, let’s take a brief look at Costco Wholesale Corporation (COST) price momentum. RSI 9-day as of the close on 24 August was 26.35%, suggesting the stock is oversold, with historical volatility in this time frame at 12.29%.
As of today, COST’s price is $537.36 -2.25% or -$12.28 from its 5-day moving average. COST is currently trading -5.44% lower than its 20-day SMA and +7.17% higher than its 100-day SMA. However, the stock’s current price level is +1.03% above the SMA50 and +9.03% above the SMA200.
The stochastic %K and %D were 7.04% and 9.45%, respectively, and the average true range (ATR) was 7.32. With the 14-day stochastic at 4.78% and the average true range at 7.32, the RSI (14) stands at 34.42%. The stock has reached -8.97 on the 9-day MACD Oscillator while the 14-day reading was at -14.79.
Analyst Ratings
William Blair launched coverage on Costco Wholesale Corporation (NASDAQ: COST) in its analyst report released on April 13, 2023. The firm assigned the stock an Outperform rating. The consensus rating for Costco Wholesale Corporation (COST) among analysts is Overweight. According to current brokerage recommendations, 0 brokerage firms advise that investors sell COST, while 11 suggest investors hold. There are 1 analyst who rate the stock as underweight. The stock is rated overweight by 4 analysts, while 20 others rate it as a “buy”.
What is COST’s price target for the next 12 months?
Analysts predict a range of price targets between $478.00 and $651.00, with a median target of $575.00. Taking a look at these predictions, the average price target given by analysts for Costco Wholesale Corporation (COST) stock is $569.36.
