Edwards Lifesciences (NYSE:EW) Price Target Raised to $78.00 at JPMorgan Chase & Co.

Edwards Lifesciences (NYSE:EW) had its price target lifted by equities research analysts at JPMorgan Chase & Co. from $72.00 to $78.00 in a research note issued on Friday, Benzinga reports. The firm currently has a “neutral” rating on the medical research company’s stock. JPMorgan Chase & Co.‘s target price would suggest a potential upside of 12.18% from the stock’s previous close.

Several other research firms have also weighed in on EW. StockNews.com lowered shares of Edwards Lifesciences from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a report on Thursday, July 25th. Daiwa Capital Markets raised shares of Edwards Lifesciences from a “neutral” rating to an “outperform” rating in a report on Wednesday, July 31st. Evercore ISI cut their price target on shares of Edwards Lifesciences from $76.00 to $70.00 and set an “in-line” rating for the company in a report on Tuesday, October 1st. Bank of America lowered shares of Edwards Lifesciences from a “buy” rating to a “neutral” rating and cut their price target for the stock from $105.00 to $75.00 in a report on Thursday, July 25th. Finally, Wolfe Research upgraded Edwards Lifesciences from an “underperform” rating to a “peer perform” rating in a research report on Monday, July 29th. Fifteen equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, ten have given a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $75.81.

Edwards Lifesciences Stock Performance

EW stock traded down $0.82 during trading on Friday, reaching $69.53. The company had a trading volume of 2,068,494 shares, compared to its average volume of 4,565,732. Edwards Lifesciences has a twelve month low of $58.93 and a twelve month high of $96.12. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.08, a quick ratio of 2.87 and a current ratio of 3.71. The company has a market cap of $41.90 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 29.74, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.83 and a beta of 1.13. The firm has a 50-day simple moving average of $68.04 and a 200-day simple moving average of $78.71.

Edwards Lifesciences (NYSE:EW) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, October 24th. The medical research company reported $0.67 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, hitting analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.67. Edwards Lifesciences had a net margin of 24.55% and a return on equity of 22.35%. The company had revenue of $1.35 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.57 billion. During the same period last year, the firm posted $0.59 EPS. Edwards Lifesciences’s revenue for the quarter was up 8.9% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, sell-side analysts expect that Edwards Lifesciences will post 2.71 earnings per share for the current year.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Edwards Lifesciences news, VP Daveen Chopra sold 1,250 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, August 20th. The shares were sold at an average price of $69.95, for a total transaction of $87,437.50. Following the completion of the transaction, the vice president now owns 29,333 shares in the company, valued at $2,051,843.35. The trade was a 0.00 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available at this link. In other news, VP Daveen Chopra sold 1,250 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, August 20th. The shares were sold at an average price of $69.95, for a total transaction of $87,437.50. Following the completion of the sale, the vice president now owns 29,333 shares in the company, valued at approximately $2,051,843.35. The trade was a 0.00 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this link. Also, VP Donald E. Bobo, Jr. sold 5,000 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Wednesday, September 11th. The shares were sold at an average price of $66.77, for a total transaction of $333,850.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the vice president now owns 46,936 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $3,133,916.72. The trade was a 0.00 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 16,250 shares of company stock worth $1,099,238 in the last quarter. 1.29% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Institutional investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Vanguard Group Inc. increased its holdings in shares of Edwards Lifesciences by 1.1% in the 1st quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 52,964,394 shares of the medical research company’s stock valued at $5,061,277,000 after acquiring an additional 600,994 shares during the period. Bank of New York Mellon Corp raised its holdings in shares of Edwards Lifesciences by 4.3% in the second quarter. Bank of New York Mellon Corp now owns 19,782,909 shares of the medical research company’s stock valued at $1,827,347,000 after buying an additional 809,605 shares during the last quarter. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD boosted its stake in shares of Edwards Lifesciences by 57.9% during the first quarter. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD now owns 6,516,260 shares of the medical research company’s stock worth $622,695,000 after buying an additional 2,390,137 shares during the period. Champlain Investment Partners LLC grew its holdings in shares of Edwards Lifesciences by 3.1% during the first quarter. Champlain Investment Partners LLC now owns 2,964,168 shares of the medical research company’s stock worth $283,256,000 after buying an additional 88,205 shares during the last quarter. Finally, AustralianSuper Pty Ltd raised its stake in Edwards Lifesciences by 14.2% during the 2nd quarter. AustralianSuper Pty Ltd now owns 2,778,812 shares of the medical research company’s stock valued at $256,679,000 after acquiring an additional 344,465 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 79.46% of the company’s stock.

Edwards Lifesciences Company Profile

Edwards Lifesciences Corporation provides products and technologies for structural heart disease and critical care monitoring in the United States, Europe, Japan, and internationally. It offers transcatheter heart valve replacement products for the minimally invasive replacement of aortic heart valves under the Edwards SAPIEN family of valves system; and transcatheter heart valve repair and replacement products to treat mitral and tricuspid valve diseases under the PASCAL PRECISION and Cardioband names.