Sterling Check Corp. (NASDAQ:STER) Receives $16.20 Average Target Price from Analysts

Sterling Check Corp. (NASDAQ:STER) has been assigned an average recommendation of “Hold” from the six ratings firms that are covering the company, Marketbeat reports. Five equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold recommendation and one has given a buy recommendation to the company. The average 12 month price target among brokers that have issued ratings on the stock in the last year is $16.20.

Separately, Citigroup boosted their target price on shares of Sterling Check from $16.20 to $17.50 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Wednesday, September 25th.

Sterling Check Stock Performance

NASDAQ:STER opened at $16.74 on Friday. The firm has a market capitalization of $1.64 billion, a PE ratio of -98.47 and a beta of 0.49. The company has a quick ratio of 1.62, a current ratio of 1.62 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.73. Sterling Check has a 12-month low of $10.00 and a 12-month high of $18.04. The firm has a 50-day moving average price of $16.55 and a 200 day moving average price of $15.74.

Sterling Check (NASDAQ:STER) last issued its earnings results on Thursday, August 8th. The company reported $0.23 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.27 by ($0.04). The company had revenue of $200.50 million during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $199.81 million. Sterling Check had a positive return on equity of 7.73% and a negative net margin of 2.07%. The company’s quarterly revenue was up 5.3% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the previous year, the company posted $0.28 earnings per share. Research analysts anticipate that Sterling Check will post 0.56 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Insider Activity at Sterling Check

In related news, major shareholder Melanie Laird sold 300,000 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, October 15th. The shares were sold at an average price of $17.18, for a total transaction of $5,154,000.00. Following the transaction, the insider now owns 10,749,576 shares in the company, valued at $184,677,715.68. This represents a 0.00 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at the SEC website. Insiders own 9.90% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Several hedge funds have recently modified their holdings of the business. Natixis bought a new stake in shares of Sterling Check in the 1st quarter valued at $1,006,000. Gabelli Funds LLC bought a new position in Sterling Check in the first quarter valued at approximately $1,475,000. GABELLI & Co INVESTMENT ADVISERS INC. bought a new stake in Sterling Check during the first quarter worth $1,449,000. Quadrature Capital Ltd acquired a new position in Sterling Check during the first quarter worth approximately $921,000. Finally, Magnetar Financial LLC acquired a new stake in Sterling Check during the 1st quarter valued at $18,939,000. Institutional investors own 84.34% of the company’s stock.

About Sterling Check

Sterling Check Corp. provides technology-enabled background and identity verification services in the United States, Canada, Europe, the Middle East and Africa, and the Asia Pacific. The company offers identity verification services, such as telecom and device verification, identification document verification, facial recognition with biometric matching, social security number verification, and live video chat identification proofing; fingerprinting; background checks, including criminal record checks, sex offender registries, civil court records, motor vehicle and driving license records, executive investigations, credit reports, social media searches, and contingent workforce solutions; liens, judgments, and bankruptcies; and sanctions, risk, and compliance checks.