Oppenheimer analyst Michael Wiederhorn maintained a Buy rating on Centene Corp (CNC) today and set a price target of $165. The company’s shares closed yesterday at $129.97.
Wiederhorn commented:
“CNC reported Q4:18 adjusted EPS of $1.38 (GAAP: $1.15) beating OPCO/Street of $1.31/$1.32E. Adjusted EPS primarily excludes $0.23 of amortization. The solid results overcame $0.04/share of additional business expansion costs related to exchange enrollment, but did benefit from a lower tax rate vs. our model due to share vesting (in line with management’s expectations). Following the quarter, CNC tweaked FY2019 EPS guidance higher to $8.22-$8.62 vs $8.15-$8.55 (split-adjusted: new range is $4.11-$4.31). Overall, the results appear solid, and the outlook boost is particularly encouraging one month into the year.”
According to TipRanks.com, Wiederhorn is a top 100 analyst with an average return of 15.5% and a 69.0% success rate. Wiederhorn covers the Services sector, focusing on stocks such as Addus Homecare Corp, UnitedHealth, and Cigna Corp.
Centene Corp has an analyst consensus of Strong Buy, with a price target consensus of $157.75, representing a 21.4% upside. In a report issued on January 25, Jefferies also reiterated a Buy rating on the stock with a $146 price target.
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Based on Centene Corp’s latest earnings release for the quarter ending September 30, the company reported a quarterly revenue of $16.18 billion and net profit of $19 million. In comparison, last year the company earned revenue of $12.81 billion and had a net profit of $230 million.
Based on the recent corporate insider activity of 92 insiders, corporate insider sentiment is positive on the stock. This means that over the past quarter there has been an increase of insiders buying their shares of CNC in relation to earlier this year. Most recently, in December 2018, Michael Neidorff, the Chairman & CEO of CNC bought 10,000 shares for a total of $570,200.
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Centene Corp. engages in the provision of programs and services to government sponsored healthcare programs. It operates through the Managed Care and Specialty Services segments. The Medicaid Managed Care segment provides health plan coverage to individuals through government subsidized programs through Medicaid.
