Vertex Energy, Inc. (NASDAQ:VTNR) has been making headlines recently as it received an average recommendation of “Moderate Buy” from nine ratings firms currently covering the firm, according to Bloomberg reports. This is certainly good news for Vertex Energy, with three investment analysts rating the stock as a hold and three giving a buy rating to the company.
Vertex Energy is primarily engaged in industrial waste stream recycling and off-specification commercial chemical product recycling. It has a specific focus on recycling used motor oil and other petroleum by-products. The company operates across three primary segments: Black Oil, Refining and Marketing, and Recovery.
The Black Oil segment involves collecting and purchasing used motor oil from third-party generators through an established network of local and regional collectors. Vertex Energy then sells this used motor oil to customers for use as feedstock or replacement fuel for industrial burners.
Institutional investors and hedge funds have also taken note of Vertex Energy’s potential value. State Street Corp increased its holdings in the company by 4,698.1% in the second quarter alone. Driehaus Capital Management LLC purchased a new position in shares of Vertex Energy during the same quarter while Invesco Ltd bought a new position during Q1 2020.
Vanguard Group Inc., one of the largest institutional investors in the world, also lifted its position in Vertex Energy by 31.2% in the third quarter of last year alone. Finally, Wells Fargo & Company MN grew its stake in Vertex Energy by almost 300% during Q2 2020 alone.
Overall, given that an average price objective among brokerages who covered VTNR this year was $14.43 per share; we can see that there is considerable confidence among analysts about Vertex’s future performance possibilities with roughly 63.44% owned by institutional investors we should see some pronounced stabilization of their value soon enough!
Environmental Services Company, Vertex Energy, Sees Ratings and Target Price Upgrades Despite Insider Sales
Vertex Energy, a leading environmental services company that recycles industrial waste streams and off-specification commercial chemical products, has received ratings and price target updates from various research firms. TD Cowen initiated coverage on Vertex Energy with a “market perform” rating and set an $8.00 price target on March 10th. In recent weeks, StockNews.com began covering the company with a “hold” rating while Craig Hallum upped their price target from $12.00 to $15.00 in a research report released on February 28th. HC Wainwright reaffirmed its “buy” rating and set a $15.00 target price on shares of Vertex Energy on March 1st.
The most significant change came from Oppenheimer, which upgraded Vertex Energy from a “market perform” rating to an “outperform” rating and assigned it with a new price target of $14.00 on March 1st.
In addition to these updates, Director Christopher Allen Stratton sold 25,000 shares of Vertex Energy’s stock for approximately $252,000 on March 6th, bringing his total number of shares down to 66,913. CEO Benjamin P. Cowart also sold 66,667 shares of the business’s stock for a total value of over $670,000.
Despite these insider sales and changes in ratings and targets by research analysts, shares of VTNR opened at $10.33 on Tuesday – higher than both the fifty- and two-hundred-day moving averages ($8.37 and $7.59 respectively). The company boasts a current ratio of 1.50 and quick ratio of 0.96 along with its impressive recycling capabilities.
Vertex Energy’s stock may have seen some turbulence in recent times but recent developments suggest greater investor confidence in this innovative environmentally focused firm that seeks to benefit people through its activities that balance industrial growth.
