In the latest trading session, 1.6 million Southwest Airlines Co (NYSE:LUV) shares changed hands as the company’s beta touched 0.96. With the company’s most recent per share price at $33.03 changing hands around $0.64 or 1.98% at last look, the market valuation stands at $19.58B. LUV’s current price is a discount, trading about -9.36% off its 52-week high of $36.12. The share price had its 52-week low at $23.58, which suggests the last value was 28.61% up since then. When we look at Southwest Airlines Co’s average trading volume, we note the 10-day average is 18.31 million shares, with the 3-month average coming to 9.84 million.
Analysts gave the Southwest Airlines Co (LUV) stock a consensus recommendation rating of Buy, calculated at a mean rating of 3.24. If we narrow down to specifics, the data shows that 0 out of 16 analysts rate the stock as a Sell, with a further 0 assigning it an Overweight rating. Of the remaining, 8 recommended LUV as a Hold, 8 felt it is a Buy and 0 rated the stock as Underweight. Southwest Airlines Co’s EPS for the current quarter is expected to be -0.16.
Southwest Airlines Co (NYSE:LUV) trade information
Instantly LUV is in green as seen in intraday trades today. With action 9.73%, the performance over the past five days has been green. The company’s shares are showing year-to-date downside of -1.75%, with the 5-day performance at 9.73% in the green. However, in the 30-day time frame, Southwest Airlines Co (NYSE:LUV) is 10.10% up. Looking at the short shares, we see there were 41.65 million shares sold at short interest cover period of 4.57 days.
The consensus price target for the stock as assigned by Wall Street analysts is 31.75, meaning bulls need a downside of -4.03% from its recent market value. According to analyst projections, LUV’s forecast low is 27 with 36 as the target high. To hit the forecast high, the stock’s price needs a -8.99% plunge from its current level, while the stock would need to tank 18.26% for it to hit the projected low.
Southwest Airlines Co (LUV) estimates and forecasts
Year-over-year growth is forecast to reach 5.75% up from the last financial year.
Consensus estimates given by 14 financial analysts project the company’s revenue in the current quarter to hit an average of 6.48B. 13 analysts are of the opinion that Southwest Airlines Co’s revenue for the current quarter will be 7.75B. The company’s revenue for the corresponding quarters a year ago was 6.33B and 7.35B respectively. According to analysts, the company will likely register a growth in its current quarter sales, forecast at 2.38%. The estimates for the next quarter sales put growth at 5.40%.
Looking at the company’s year-on-year earnings, data shows that the past 5-year has an earnings growth rate of -29.29%. The 2025 estimates are for Southwest Airlines Co earnings to increase by 81.16%, but the outlook for the next 5-year period is at 51.93% per year.
LUV Dividends
Southwest Airlines Co is expected to release its next quarterly earnings report on 2025-Jan-29. The 2.18% annual yield figure for the share gives it an annual dividend of 0.72. It is important to note, however, that the 2.18% dividend yield ratio should serve as a guide only, as you should also take into consideration many other aspects of a company’s operations and fundamentals before making any investment decision. During the past 5 years, the average dividend yield was 1.03 per year.
Southwest Airlines Co (NYSE:LUV)’s Major holders
If we look at who the major shareholders are, we find that insiders hold 0.40% of Southwest Airlines Co shares while 87.63% of the shares are in the hands of institutional holders. The share float percentage for the stock currently stands at 87.98%. There are 87.63% institutions holding the Southwest Airlines Co stock share, with VANGUARD GROUP INC the top institutional holder. As of 2024-06-30, the company held 11.3238% of the shares, roughly 67.6 million LUV shares worth $1.93 billion.
CAPITAL WORLD INVESTORS holds the second largest percentage of outstanding shares, with 9.6694% or 57.92 million shares worth $1.66 billion as of 2024-06-30.
Among Mutual Funds, the top two as of Dec 31, 2024 were Vanguard/Primecap Fund and American Balanced Fund. With 25.17 shares estimated at $830.99 million under it, the former controlled 4.25% of total outstanding shares. On the other hand, American Balanced Fund held about 3.65% of the shares, roughly 21.61 shares worth around $713.53 million.
