Biondo Investment Advisors LLC Trims Stock Position in Illumina, Inc. (NASDAQ:ILMN)

Biondo Investment Advisors LLC trimmed its holdings in Illumina, Inc. (NASDAQ:ILMN) by 11.7% in the 4th quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the SEC. The firm owned 69,166 shares of the life sciences company’s stock after selling 9,156 shares during the period. Biondo Investment Advisors LLC’s holdings in Illumina were worth $9,243,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Several other hedge funds and other institutional investors also recently added to or reduced their stakes in ILMN. WCM Investment Management LLC grew its holdings in shares of Illumina by 26.6% during the 4th quarter. WCM Investment Management LLC now owns 4,129,855 shares of the life sciences company’s stock worth $551,625,000 after purchasing an additional 867,673 shares during the period. Bank of New York Mellon Corp boosted its stake in Illumina by 0.8% during the fourth quarter. Bank of New York Mellon Corp now owns 3,402,057 shares of the life sciences company’s stock worth $454,617,000 after buying an additional 27,618 shares during the period. Geode Capital Management LLC increased its position in shares of Illumina by 1.8% during the third quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 2,727,827 shares of the life sciences company’s stock valued at $354,933,000 after acquiring an additional 48,018 shares during the last quarter. Janus Henderson Group PLC raised its stake in shares of Illumina by 40.5% in the 3rd quarter. Janus Henderson Group PLC now owns 2,168,057 shares of the life sciences company’s stock valued at $282,735,000 after acquiring an additional 625,245 shares during the period. Finally, Norges Bank acquired a new position in shares of Illumina in the 4th quarter worth approximately $228,714,000. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 89.42% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

ILMN has been the topic of a number of research analyst reports. Royal Bank of Canada cut their target price on Illumina from $247.00 to $128.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a research report on Wednesday, March 12th. Barclays reiterated an “underweight” rating on shares of Illumina in a report on Tuesday, March 11th. Morgan Stanley lowered their target price on Illumina from $150.00 to $136.00 and set an “equal weight” rating for the company in a report on Tuesday, February 11th. Guggenheim cut their price target on shares of Illumina from $170.00 to $150.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research note on Friday, February 7th. Finally, TD Cowen lowered shares of Illumina from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating and lowered their price objective for the company from $177.00 to $140.00 in a research note on Friday, February 7th. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, ten have given a hold rating, ten have given a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat.com, Illumina presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $140.90.

Illumina Trading Down 2.8 %

NASDAQ:ILMN opened at $80.00 on Friday. Illumina, Inc. has a 1 year low of $79.30 and a 1 year high of $156.66. The stock has a market cap of $12.67 billion, a P/E ratio of -10.42, a P/E/G ratio of 1.60 and a beta of 1.17. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.63, a quick ratio of 1.42 and a current ratio of 1.77. The stock has a 50-day simple moving average of $102.80 and a 200-day simple moving average of $126.79.

Illumina (NASDAQ:ILMN) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, February 6th. The life sciences company reported $0.86 EPS for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $0.92 by ($0.06). Illumina had a negative net margin of 27.95% and a positive return on equity of 13.37%. As a group, analysts anticipate that Illumina, Inc. will post 4.51 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Illumina Profile

Illumina, Inc offers sequencing- and array-based solutions for genetic and genomic analysis in the United States, Singapore, the United Kingdom, and internationally. It operates through Core Illumina and GRAIL segments. The company offers sequencing and array-based instruments and consumables, which include reagents, flow cells, and library preparation; whole-genome sequencing kits, which sequence entire genomes of various size and complexity; and targeted resequencing kits, which sequence exomes, specific genes, and RNA or other genomic regions of interest.