AudioCodes Ltd. (NASDAQ:AUDC) Short Interest Down 15.7% in January

AudioCodes Ltd. (NASDAQ:AUDC) was the target of a large decline in short interest in the month of January. As of January 31st, there was short interest totalling 132,500 shares, a decline of 15.7% from the January 15th total of 157,200 shares. Currently, 0.6% of the company’s shares are short sold. Based on an average trading volume of 106,300 shares, the short-interest ratio is presently 1.2 days.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On AudioCodes

Several large investors have recently bought and sold shares of the stock. Jane Street Group LLC acquired a new position in shares of AudioCodes during the fourth quarter worth about $406,000. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP lifted its stake in AudioCodes by 5.5% in the fourth quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP now owns 230,526 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock worth $2,245,000 after acquiring an additional 12,090 shares during the last quarter. Senvest Management LLC increased its position in shares of AudioCodes by 0.8% in the 4th quarter. Senvest Management LLC now owns 2,601,756 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock valued at $25,341,000 after purchasing an additional 21,308 shares during the last quarter. Trexquant Investment LP increased its position in shares of AudioCodes by 41.7% in the 4th quarter. Trexquant Investment LP now owns 107,475 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock valued at $1,047,000 after purchasing an additional 31,622 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Arrowstreet Capital Limited Partnership raised its holdings in shares of AudioCodes by 55.4% in the 4th quarter. Arrowstreet Capital Limited Partnership now owns 527,768 shares of the communications equipment provider’s stock valued at $5,187,000 after purchasing an additional 188,074 shares in the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 68.05% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

Several analysts have recently weighed in on AUDC shares. Needham & Company LLC increased their price target on shares of AudioCodes from $11.00 to $12.50 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Wednesday, February 5th. StockNews.com raised AudioCodes from a “buy” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Wednesday, February 5th. Finally, Barclays upped their target price on shares of AudioCodes from $9.00 to $10.00 and gave the company an “underweight” rating in a research report on Wednesday, February 5th.

AudioCodes Stock Down 1.3 %

AUDC opened at $11.75 on Monday. AudioCodes has a 52 week low of $7.70 and a 52 week high of $14.04. The business has a fifty day simple moving average of $10.30 and a 200-day simple moving average of $9.86. The firm has a market cap of $355.09 million, a P/E ratio of 23.50 and a beta of 0.80.

AudioCodes (NASDAQ:AUDC) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, February 4th. The communications equipment provider reported $0.31 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.22 by $0.09. AudioCodes had a net margin of 6.32% and a return on equity of 10.47%. Sell-side analysts expect that AudioCodes will post 0.7 earnings per share for the current year.

AudioCodes Dividend Announcement

The business also recently disclosed a semi-annual dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, March 6th. Stockholders of record on Thursday, February 20th will be given a dividend of $0.18 per share. This represents a dividend yield of 3%. The ex-dividend date is Thursday, February 20th. AudioCodes’s dividend payout ratio is currently 72.00%.

About AudioCodes

AudioCodes Ltd. provides advanced communications software, products, and productivity solutions for the digital workplace worldwide. The company offers solutions, products, and services for unified communications, contact centers, hosted business services, Voice.AI, and service provider businesses. Its products include session border controllers, life cycle management solutions, VoIP network routing solutions, media gateways and servers, multi-service business routers, IP phones solutions, and value-added applications, as well as professional services.