Yelp Inc. (NYSE:YELP) Short Interest Update

Yelp Inc. (NYSE:YELP) saw a large decline in short interest in February. As of February 28th, there was short interest totalling 4,030,000 shares, a decline of 14.8% from the February 13th total of 4,730,000 shares. Based on an average daily volume of 718,600 shares, the short-interest ratio is presently 5.6 days. Approximately 6.4% of the company’s stock are sold short.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other Yelp news, insider Carmen Amara sold 11,238 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, March 7th. The stock was sold at an average price of $35.00, for a total value of $393,330.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the insider now owns 108,123 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $3,784,305. The trade was a 9.42 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. Also, insider Craig Saldanha sold 1,000 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, December 23rd. The stock was sold at an average price of $37.99, for a total value of $37,990.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the insider now directly owns 183,558 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $6,973,368.42. This trade represents a 0.54 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 57,727 shares of company stock worth $2,083,317 in the last quarter. Corporate insiders own 7.40% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

A number of hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in the stock. Pacer Advisors Inc. grew its stake in shares of Yelp by 1.8% during the 3rd quarter. Pacer Advisors Inc. now owns 2,743,899 shares of the local business review company’s stock valued at $96,256,000 after acquiring an additional 48,363 shares during the period. State Street Corp grew its stake in shares of Yelp by 0.9% during the 3rd quarter. State Street Corp now owns 2,553,227 shares of the local business review company’s stock valued at $89,567,000 after acquiring an additional 23,719 shares during the period. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP grew its stake in shares of Yelp by 9.3% during the 4th quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP now owns 1,924,457 shares of the local business review company’s stock valued at $74,477,000 after acquiring an additional 164,149 shares during the period. Arrowstreet Capital Limited Partnership grew its stake in shares of Yelp by 16.1% during the 4th quarter. Arrowstreet Capital Limited Partnership now owns 1,845,575 shares of the local business review company’s stock valued at $71,424,000 after acquiring an additional 255,775 shares during the period. Finally, Geode Capital Management LLC grew its stake in shares of Yelp by 0.9% during the 4th quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 1,774,878 shares of the local business review company’s stock valued at $68,702,000 after acquiring an additional 15,649 shares during the period. 90.11% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Yelp Stock Performance

Shares of NYSE YELP traded up $0.26 during midday trading on Wednesday, hitting $35.25. 161,072 shares of the company’s stock traded hands, compared to its average volume of 675,832. Yelp has a 1 year low of $32.56 and a 1 year high of $41.72. The stock has a market capitalization of $2.29 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 18.35, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 0.76 and a beta of 1.40. The firm has a fifty day moving average of $37.67 and a 200 day moving average of $36.68.

Yelp (NYSE:YELP) last released its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, February 13th. The local business review company reported $0.62 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.53 by $0.09. The firm had revenue of $361.95 million during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $350.73 million. Yelp had a net margin of 9.41% and a return on equity of 18.07%. On average, equities analysts anticipate that Yelp will post 2.22 earnings per share for the current year.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

Separately, Morgan Stanley boosted their target price on Yelp from $34.00 to $35.00 and gave the stock an “underweight” rating in a research report on Monday, January 13th. Two analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, six have assigned a hold rating, one has assigned a buy rating and one has issued a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has an average rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $37.17.

Yelp Company Profile

Yelp Inc operates a platform that connects consumers with local businesses in the United States and internationally. The company's platform covers various categories, including restaurants, shopping, beauty and fitness, health, and other categories, as well as home, local, auto, professional, pets, events, real estate, and financial services.