Stock Traders Purchase Large Volume of Call Options on Cleveland-Cliffs (NYSE:CLF)

Cleveland-Cliffs Inc. (NYSE:CLF) was the target of some unusual options trading activity on Friday. Investors acquired 76,468 call options on the company. This represents an increase of 86% compared to the typical daily volume of 41,201 call options.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

CLF has been the subject of several recent analyst reports. Morgan Stanley lowered their price target on Cleveland-Cliffs from $13.00 to $11.00 and set an “equal weight” rating for the company in a report on Monday. Citigroup dropped their price objective on shares of Cleveland-Cliffs from $12.50 to $11.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a report on Thursday, December 19th. Glj Research raised shares of Cleveland-Cliffs from a “sell” rating to a “buy” rating and set a $14.27 target price for the company in a research note on Tuesday, January 7th. StockNews.com downgraded Cleveland-Cliffs from a “hold” rating to a “sell” rating in a research note on Thursday, November 7th. Finally, The Goldman Sachs Group began coverage on Cleveland-Cliffs in a report on Monday, December 2nd. They set a “buy” rating and a $16.00 price objective for the company. Three investment analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, five have given a hold rating, four have given a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat.com, the company presently has an average rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $16.68.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Several large investors have recently bought and sold shares of CLF. Pacer Advisors Inc. grew its holdings in shares of Cleveland-Cliffs by 13.7% during the 3rd quarter. Pacer Advisors Inc. now owns 25,893,879 shares of the mining company’s stock worth $330,665,000 after purchasing an additional 3,110,651 shares in the last quarter. Bank of New York Mellon Corp boosted its stake in Cleveland-Cliffs by 20.1% in the fourth quarter. Bank of New York Mellon Corp now owns 7,382,769 shares of the mining company’s stock valued at $69,398,000 after buying an additional 1,236,247 shares in the last quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. lifted its holdings in shares of Cleveland-Cliffs by 11.3% in the fourth quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. now owns 4,176,194 shares of the mining company’s stock worth $39,256,000 after acquiring an additional 425,041 shares during the last quarter. Hodges Capital Management Inc. lifted its stake in Cleveland-Cliffs by 13.4% in the 4th quarter. Hodges Capital Management Inc. now owns 3,316,786 shares of the mining company’s stock valued at $31,178,000 after purchasing an additional 391,109 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Drexel Morgan & Co. boosted its position in Cleveland-Cliffs by 3.8% in the third quarter. Drexel Morgan & Co. now owns 3,200,395 shares of the mining company’s stock valued at $40,869,000 after buying an additional 116,400 shares in the last quarter. 67.68% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Cleveland-Cliffs Stock Performance

NYSE:CLF traded down $0.18 during mid-day trading on Friday, hitting $10.49. The stock had a trading volume of 3,934,447 shares, compared to its average volume of 12,687,958. Cleveland-Cliffs has a twelve month low of $8.99 and a twelve month high of $22.97. The stock has a market cap of $5.18 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of -10.81 and a beta of 1.96. The company’s 50 day simple moving average is $10.35 and its 200 day simple moving average is $12.00. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.53, a quick ratio of 0.55 and a current ratio of 1.85.

Cleveland-Cliffs (NYSE:CLF) last released its quarterly earnings data on Monday, November 4th. The mining company reported ($0.33) EPS for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of ($0.31) by ($0.02). The company had revenue of $4.57 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $4.72 billion. Cleveland-Cliffs had a negative return on equity of 0.59% and a negative net margin of 2.31%. The company’s revenue for the quarter was down 18.5% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period last year, the firm earned $0.54 earnings per share. On average, equities research analysts forecast that Cleveland-Cliffs will post -0.69 earnings per share for the current year.

Cleveland-Cliffs Company Profile

Cleveland-Cliffs is the largest flat-rolled steel company and the largest iron ore pellet producer in North America. The company is vertically integrated from mining through iron making, steelmaking, rolling, finishing and downstream with hot and cold stamping of steel parts and components. The company was formerly known as Cliffs Natural Resources Inc and changed its name to Cleveland-Cliffs Inc in August 2017.