Press coverage about Whole Foods Market (NASDAQ:WFM) has trended somewhat positive this week, according to Accern. The research firm ranks the sentiment of press coverage by monitoring more than 20 million news and blog sources. Accern ranks coverage of publicly-traded companies on a scale of negative one to positive one, with scores closest to one being the most favorable. Whole Foods Market earned a media sentiment score of 0.22 on Accern’s scale. Accern also assigned headlines about the company an impact score of 45.9396383229203 out of 100, meaning that recent press coverage is somewhat unlikely to have an impact on the stock’s share price in the next several days.
These are some of the headlines that may have effected Accern Sentiment Analysis’s analysis:
- Whole Foods: Hopes Dim For A Higher Bid (seekingalpha.com)
- Why supermarkets want to sell you ugly fruits and vegetables (finance.yahoo.com)
- Whole Foods Market (WFM) Receiving Positive News Coverage, Accern Reports - Newburgh Gazette (newburghgazette.com)
- Is the Options Market Predicting a Spike in Whole Foods Market, Inc. (WFM) Stock? (finance.yahoo.com)
A number of brokerages recently issued reports on WFM. UBS AG reiterated a “sell” rating and set a $25.00 price objective on shares of Whole Foods Market in a research note on Friday, April 14th. Wells Fargo & Company reiterated a “hold” rating on shares of Whole Foods Market in a research note on Wednesday, July 26th. BidaskClub downgraded Whole Foods Market from a “hold” rating to a “sell” rating in a research note on Tuesday, July 25th. Royal Bank Of Canada reiterated a “buy” rating and set a $42.00 price objective on shares of Whole Foods Market in a research note on Tuesday, July 18th. Finally, SunTrust Banks, Inc. downgraded Whole Foods Market from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating and boosted their price objective for the company from $40.00 to $42.00 in a research note on Tuesday, June 20th. Four equities research analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, nineteen have given a hold rating and four have issued a buy rating to the stock. The stock has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $38.06.
Whole Foods Market (NASDAQ WFM) traded down 0.07% during mid-day trading on Friday, reaching $41.81. The company had a trading volume of 3,475,249 shares. The stock has a market capitalization of $13.38 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 34.44 and a beta of 0.82. Whole Foods Market has a 52 week low of $27.67 and a 52 week high of $43.84. The stock has a 50 day moving average of $41.52 and a 200 day moving average of $34.78.
Whole Foods Market (NASDAQ:WFM) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, July 26th. The company reported $0.36 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the Zacks’ consensus estimate of $0.33 by $0.03. The firm had revenue of $3.73 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $3.72 billion. Whole Foods Market had a return on equity of 13.26% and a net margin of 2.44%. The business’s revenue was up .6% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the previous year, the company posted $0.37 earnings per share. Analysts anticipate that Whole Foods Market will post $1.34 earnings per share for the current year.
Whole Foods Market declared that its Board of Directors has approved a share buyback program on Wednesday, May 10th that authorizes the company to buyback $1.25 billion in outstanding shares. This buyback authorization authorizes the company to reacquire up to 10.8% of its stock through open market purchases. Stock buyback programs are typically an indication that the company’s board believes its stock is undervalued.
The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Tuesday, July 11th. Investors of record on Friday, June 30th were given a dividend of $0.18 per share. This is an increase from Whole Foods Market’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.14. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Wednesday, June 28th. This represents a $0.72 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.72%. Whole Foods Market’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 59.02%.
In related news, insider Laura A. Derba sold 2,200 shares of Whole Foods Market stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, May 16th. The stock was sold at an average price of $36.48, for a total transaction of $80,256.00. Following the transaction, the insider now owns 3,418 shares in the company, valued at $124,688.64. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is accessible through this link. Also, insider Juan Nunez sold 14,502 shares of Whole Foods Market stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, May 18th. The stock was sold at an average price of $27.52, for a total value of $399,095.04. Following the transaction, the insider now owns 5,746 shares in the company, valued at approximately $158,129.92. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last quarter, insiders have sold 18,466 shares of company stock worth $543,688. 1.30% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.
Whole Foods Market Company Profile
Whole Foods Market, Inc is engaged in the business of natural and organic foods supermarket. The Company operates approximately 456 stores in the United States, Canada and the United Kingdom. Its stores have an average size of approximately 39,000 square feet, and are supported by its distribution centers, bake house facilities, commissary kitchens, seafood-processing facilities, a produce procurement center, and a specialty coffee and tea procurement and roasting operation, among others.
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