Cleveland-Cliffs (NYSE:CLF) Shares Down 1% – Time to Sell?

Cleveland-Cliffs Inc. (NYSE:CLF)’s stock price fell 1% on Thursday . The stock traded as low as $9.30 and last traded at $9.47. 3,212,665 shares traded hands during mid-day trading, a decline of 74% from the average session volume of 12,574,186 shares. The stock had previously closed at $9.56.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several research firms have weighed in on CLF. Citigroup decreased their target price on shares of Cleveland-Cliffs from $12.50 to $11.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a report on Thursday, December 19th. Glj Research reduced their price target on shares of Cleveland-Cliffs from $14.54 to $12.90 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research note on Thursday, February 27th. B. Riley reissued a “buy” rating on shares of Cleveland-Cliffs in a research note on Tuesday, February 4th. Morgan Stanley reduced their price target on shares of Cleveland-Cliffs from $13.00 to $11.00 and set an “equal weight” rating on the stock in a research note on Monday, February 3rd. Finally, The Goldman Sachs Group reduced their price target on shares of Cleveland-Cliffs from $17.00 to $15.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research note on Tuesday, March 4th. Two analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, four have issued a hold rating, four have given a buy rating and one has issued a strong buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $16.43.

Cleveland-Cliffs Price Performance

The company’s 50-day moving average is $10.39 and its 200-day moving average is $11.34. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.53, a current ratio of 1.85 and a quick ratio of 0.55. The firm has a market capitalization of $4.68 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of -9.77 and a beta of 1.94.

Cleveland-Cliffs (NYSE:CLF) last released its earnings results on Monday, February 24th. The mining company reported ($0.68) earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of ($0.65) by ($0.03). Cleveland-Cliffs had a negative return on equity of 0.59% and a negative net margin of 2.31%. The company had revenue of $4.33 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $4.46 billion. On average, research analysts expect that Cleveland-Cliffs Inc. will post -0.79 earnings per share for the current year.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other Cleveland-Cliffs news, Director Jane M. Cronin purchased 10,000 shares of Cleveland-Cliffs stock in a transaction on Friday, February 28th. The shares were purchased at an average cost of $10.56 per share, with a total value of $105,600.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the director now directly owns 24,522 shares in the company, valued at approximately $258,952.32. This represents a 68.86 % increase in their position. The acquisition was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at the SEC website. Also, Director John T. Baldwin acquired 4,000 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, March 10th. The shares were purchased at an average price of $8.70 per share, for a total transaction of $34,800.00. Following the purchase, the director now directly owns 133,227 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $1,159,074.90. This trade represents a 3.10 % increase in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this purchase can be found here. Over the last three months, insiders have purchased 23,500 shares of company stock valued at $243,095. Insiders own 1.76% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Trading of Cleveland-Cliffs

A number of hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in the company. Vanguard Group Inc. raised its stake in shares of Cleveland-Cliffs by 5.5% during the fourth quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 48,751,789 shares of the mining company’s stock valued at $458,267,000 after purchasing an additional 2,556,332 shares during the period. Pacer Advisors Inc. boosted its holdings in Cleveland-Cliffs by 13.7% in the third quarter. Pacer Advisors Inc. now owns 25,893,879 shares of the mining company’s stock worth $330,665,000 after purchasing an additional 3,110,651 shares during the period. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP boosted its holdings in shares of Cleveland-Cliffs by 3.1% during the fourth quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP now owns 21,247,426 shares of the mining company’s stock valued at $199,724,000 after acquiring an additional 647,282 shares during the period. Slate Path Capital LP grew its position in shares of Cleveland-Cliffs by 35.4% during the fourth quarter. Slate Path Capital LP now owns 16,208,000 shares of the mining company’s stock worth $152,355,000 after acquiring an additional 4,239,000 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Geode Capital Management LLC grew its position in shares of Cleveland-Cliffs by 3.2% during the fourth quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 8,466,747 shares of the mining company’s stock worth $79,611,000 after acquiring an additional 264,078 shares during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 67.68% of the company’s stock.

About Cleveland-Cliffs

Cleveland-Cliffs is the largest flat-rolled steel company and the largest iron ore pellet producer in North America. The company is vertically integrated from mining through iron making, steelmaking, rolling, finishing and downstream with hot and cold stamping of steel parts and components. The company was formerly known as Cliffs Natural Resources Inc and changed its name to Cleveland-Cliffs Inc in August 2017.