TAL Education Group (NYSE:TAL) Shares Down 4%

TAL Education Group (NYSE:TAL)’s share price traded down 4% during mid-day trading on Wednesday . The company traded as low as $11.63 and last traded at $11.70. 2,198,408 shares traded hands during mid-day trading, a decline of 68% from the average session volume of 6,940,321 shares. The stock had previously closed at $12.19.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of equities analysts recently commented on TAL shares. StockNews.com lowered TAL Education Group from a “hold” rating to a “sell” rating in a research note on Wednesday, February 7th. TheStreet raised TAL Education Group from a “d+” rating to a “c-” rating in a research report on Wednesday, February 14th. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. raised TAL Education Group from a “neutral” rating to an “overweight” rating and boosted their price objective for the stock from $10.00 to $15.00 in a research report on Thursday, January 25th. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating and four have given a buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, TAL Education Group currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $12.37.

TAL Education Group Stock Performance

The firm has a market cap of $7.80 billion, a P/E ratio of -110.82 and a beta of 0.15. The stock has a fifty day simple moving average of $12.51 and a 200 day simple moving average of $11.53.

TAL Education Group (NYSE:TAL) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, January 25th. The company reported ($0.04) EPS for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of ($0.02) by ($0.02). TAL Education Group had a negative net margin of 5.30% and a negative return on equity of 1.93%. The business had revenue of $373.51 million during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $330.96 million. Research analysts predict that TAL Education Group will post -0.06 earnings per share for the current year.

Institutional Trading of TAL Education Group

Several hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in the business. HCEP Management Ltd grew its position in shares of TAL Education Group by 456.4% during the 4th quarter. HCEP Management Ltd now owns 5,000,000 shares of the company’s stock valued at $63,150,000 after acquiring an additional 4,101,330 shares during the period. Keystone Investors PTE Ltd. acquired a new position in TAL Education Group during the third quarter worth $24,353,000. Krane Funds Advisors LLC lifted its stake in TAL Education Group by 14.0% during the third quarter. Krane Funds Advisors LLC now owns 17,771,371 shares of the company’s stock worth $161,897,000 after purchasing an additional 2,177,640 shares in the last quarter. National Bank of Canada FI acquired a new stake in shares of TAL Education Group in the fourth quarter valued at $22,144,000. Finally, WT Asset Management Ltd increased its holdings in TAL Education Group by 108.7% in the fourth quarter. WT Asset Management Ltd now owns 3,501,979 shares of the company’s stock valued at $44,230,000 after buying an additional 1,824,094 shares during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 37.79% of the company’s stock.

About TAL Education Group

TAL Education Group provides K-12 after-school tutoring services in the People's Republic of China. The company offers tutoring services to K-12 students covering various academic subjects, including mathematics, physics, chemistry, biology, history, geography, political science, English, and Chinese.