BlackLine (NASDAQ:BL) Upgraded at Morgan Stanley

BlackLine (NASDAQ:BL) was upgraded by Morgan Stanley from an “equal weight” rating to an “overweight” rating in a research report issued to clients and investors on Monday, MarketBeat Ratings reports. The brokerage currently has a $70.00 price objective on the technology company’s stock, up from their previous price objective of $60.00. Morgan Stanley’s target price would suggest a potential upside of 29.32% from the company’s current price.

BL has been the subject of a number of other research reports. JPMorgan Chase & Co. cut their price objective on shares of BlackLine from $50.00 to $47.00 and set an “underweight” rating for the company in a research note on Wednesday, August 7th. Piper Sandler reduced their price objective on BlackLine from $55.00 to $51.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a research note on Wednesday, August 7th. Citigroup decreased their price objective on BlackLine from $62.00 to $54.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a report on Friday, June 28th. Truist Financial dropped their target price on BlackLine from $60.00 to $45.00 and set a “hold” rating for the company in a report on Wednesday, August 7th. Finally, BTIG Research decreased their price target on BlackLine from $71.00 to $65.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research note on Wednesday, August 7th. Two analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, seven have assigned a hold rating and four have given a buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $59.90.

BlackLine Stock Performance

BlackLine stock opened at $54.13 on Monday. BlackLine has a fifty-two week low of $43.37 and a fifty-two week high of $69.31. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 2.74, a quick ratio of 1.95 and a current ratio of 1.95. The stock has a market cap of $3.35 billion, a P/E ratio of 235.35, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 12.80 and a beta of 0.89. The firm’s fifty day moving average price is $49.67 and its 200-day moving average price is $52.85.

BlackLine (NASDAQ:BL) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, August 6th. The technology company reported $0.58 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.50 by $0.08. The firm had revenue of $160.51 million during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $158.21 million. BlackLine had a return on equity of 33.96% and a net margin of 19.46%. The company’s revenue was up 11.0% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the previous year, the company posted ($0.69) earnings per share. On average, equities research analysts expect that BlackLine will post 0.94 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Insider Activity at BlackLine

In other BlackLine news, insider Karole Morgan-Prager sold 10,000 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, August 7th. The shares were sold at an average price of $50.00, for a total transaction of $500,000.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the insider now owns 115,424 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $5,771,200. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through the SEC website. In other news, insider Karole Morgan-Prager sold 10,000 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, August 7th. The shares were sold at an average price of $50.00, for a total transaction of $500,000.00. Following the sale, the insider now owns 115,424 shares in the company, valued at $5,771,200. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available at this link. Also, CFO Mark Partin sold 85,308 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, September 30th. The stock was sold at an average price of $54.84, for a total transaction of $4,678,290.72. Following the completion of the sale, the chief financial officer now owns 226,844 shares in the company, valued at approximately $12,440,124.96. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold a total of 117,721 shares of company stock valued at $6,379,052 in the last three months. Company insiders own 9.93% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On BlackLine

Institutional investors and hedge funds have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the stock. Quarry LP bought a new position in BlackLine in the second quarter worth approximately $32,000. YHB Investment Advisors Inc. bought a new position in BlackLine in the first quarter worth approximately $33,000. EntryPoint Capital LLC bought a new position in BlackLine in the first quarter worth approximately $36,000. 1620 Investment Advisors Inc. bought a new position in BlackLine in the second quarter worth approximately $64,000. Finally, Covestor Ltd raised its position in BlackLine by 29.4% in the first quarter. Covestor Ltd now owns 1,495 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $97,000 after acquiring an additional 340 shares during the period. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 95.13% of the company’s stock.

BlackLine Company Profile

BlackLine, Inc provides cloud-based solutions to automate and streamline accounting and finance operations worldwide. It offers financial close management solutions, such as account reconciliations that provides a centralized workspace for users to collaborate on account reconciliations; transaction matching that analyzes and reconciles individual transactions; task management to create and manage processes and task lists; and financial reporting analytics that enables analysis and validation of financial data.