Wave Life Sciences Ltd. (NASDAQ:WVE) Short Interest Update

Wave Life Sciences Ltd. (NASDAQ:WVE) saw a significant increase in short interest in the month of October. As of October 31st, there was short interest totalling 6,820,000 shares, an increase of 39.5% from the October 15th total of 4,890,000 shares. Based on an average trading volume of 1,690,000 shares, the days-to-cover ratio is currently 4.0 days.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other news, major shareholder Plc Gsk bought 2,791,930 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, September 27th. The shares were acquired at an average price of $8.00 per share, for a total transaction of $22,335,440.00. Following the completion of the acquisition, the insider now directly owns 16,775,691 shares in the company, valued at approximately $134,205,528. This represents a 19.97 % increase in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available at this link. Also, insider Chris Francis sold 36,000 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Friday, November 8th. The stock was sold at an average price of $16.00, for a total value of $576,000.00. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 400,822 shares of company stock valued at $5,221,768 over the last ninety days. 29.10% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

Institutional Trading of Wave Life Sciences

Institutional investors and hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in the company. Maverick Capital Ltd. boosted its holdings in Wave Life Sciences by 31.0% during the third quarter. Maverick Capital Ltd. now owns 10,047,520 shares of the company’s stock worth $82,390,000 after purchasing an additional 2,378,159 shares during the last quarter. Artal Group S.A. lifted its position in shares of Wave Life Sciences by 34.7% during the 1st quarter. Artal Group S.A. now owns 4,051,400 shares of the company’s stock worth $24,997,000 after buying an additional 1,044,000 shares in the last quarter. Emerald Advisers LLC boosted its stake in shares of Wave Life Sciences by 15.6% in the 3rd quarter. Emerald Advisers LLC now owns 2,881,510 shares of the company’s stock worth $23,628,000 after buying an additional 388,280 shares during the last quarter. Emerald Mutual Fund Advisers Trust grew its holdings in shares of Wave Life Sciences by 16.6% in the third quarter. Emerald Mutual Fund Advisers Trust now owns 2,123,466 shares of the company’s stock valued at $17,412,000 after acquiring an additional 302,528 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD increased its position in shares of Wave Life Sciences by 14.4% during the first quarter. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD now owns 1,861,254 shares of the company’s stock valued at $11,485,000 after acquiring an additional 233,891 shares during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 89.73% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

Several analysts have recently commented on WVE shares. Wells Fargo & Company raised their price objective on shares of Wave Life Sciences from $11.00 to $22.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research report on Wednesday, October 16th. Raymond James raised shares of Wave Life Sciences from an “outperform” rating to a “strong-buy” rating and lifted their price target for the company from $13.00 to $22.00 in a research note on Wednesday, October 16th. Truist Financial increased their price objective on shares of Wave Life Sciences from $17.00 to $36.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research report on Tuesday. Royal Bank of Canada boosted their target price on Wave Life Sciences from $7.00 to $15.00 and gave the company a “sector perform” rating in a research report on Monday, October 21st. Finally, HC Wainwright reiterated a “buy” rating and issued a $22.00 price target on shares of Wave Life Sciences in a report on Wednesday. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, one has assigned a hold rating, eight have issued a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $21.89.

Wave Life Sciences Price Performance

Shares of WVE opened at $15.00 on Friday. Wave Life Sciences has a 52 week low of $3.50 and a 52 week high of $16.74. The stock has a 50 day moving average price of $10.40 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $7.41.

Wave Life Sciences (NASDAQ:WVE) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, November 12th. The company reported ($0.47) earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of ($0.28) by ($0.19). The company had revenue of ($7.68) million for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $15.45 million. Wave Life Sciences had a negative return on equity of 280.57% and a negative net margin of 66.50%. On average, equities analysts anticipate that Wave Life Sciences will post -1.06 earnings per share for the current year.

Wave Life Sciences Company Profile

Wave Life Sciences Ltd., a clinical-stage biotechnology company, designs, develops, and commercializes ribonucleic acid (RNA) medicines through PRISM, a discovery and drug development platform. The company's RNA medicines platform, PRISM, combines multiple modalities, chemistry innovation, and deep insights into human genetics to deliver scientific breakthroughs that treat both rare and prevalent disorders.