In the latest trading session, 1.31 million Merck & Co Inc (NYSE:MRK) shares changed hands as the company’s beta touched 0.39. With the company’s most recent per share price at $94.91 changing hands around $0.19 or 0.20% at last look, the market valuation stands at $239.75B. MRK’s current price is a discount, trading about -41.85% off its 52-week high of $134.63. The share price had its 52-week low at $81.04, which suggests the last value was 14.61% up since then. When we look at Merck & Co Inc’s average trading volume, we note the 10-day average is 15.32 million shares, with the 3-month average coming to 14.52 million.
Analysts gave the Merck & Co Inc (MRK) stock a consensus recommendation rating of Buy, calculated at a mean rating of 1.84. If we narrow down to specifics, the data shows that 0 out of 19 analysts rate the stock as a Sell, with a further 0 assigning it an Overweight rating. Of the remaining, 0 recommended MRK as a Hold, 19 felt it is a Buy and 0 rated the stock as Underweight.
Merck & Co Inc (NYSE:MRK) trade information
Instantly MRK is in green as seen in intraday trades today. With action 1.67%, the performance over the past five days has been green. The company’s shares are showing year-to-date downside of -4.59%, with the 5-day performance at 1.67% in the green. However, in the 30-day time frame, Merck & Co Inc (NYSE:MRK) is 13.95% up. Looking at the short shares, we see there were 40.94 million shares sold at short interest cover period of 2.23 days.
The consensus price target for the stock as assigned by Wall Street analysts is 136, meaning bulls need an upside of 30.21% from its recent market value. According to analyst projections, MRK’s forecast low is 106 with 148 as the target high. To hit the forecast high, the stock’s price needs a -55.94% plunge from its current level, while the stock would need to soar -11.68% for it to hit the projected low.
Merck & Co Inc (MRK) estimates and forecasts
Looking at the company’s year-on-year earnings, data shows that the past 5-year has an earnings growth rate of 12.04%. The 2025 estimates are for Merck & Co Inc earnings to increase by 17.30%, but the outlook for the next 5-year period is at 12.66% per year.
MRK Dividends
Merck & Co Inc is expected to release its next quarterly earnings report on 2025-Feb-03. The 3.33% annual yield figure for the share gives it an annual dividend of 3.16. It is important to note, however, that the 3.33% 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 2.93 per year.
Merck & Co Inc (NYSE:MRK)’s Major holders
If we look at who the major shareholders are, we find that insiders hold 0.07% of Merck & Co Inc shares while 80.35% of the shares are in the hands of institutional holders. The share float percentage for the stock currently stands at 80.40%. There are 80.35% institutions holding the Merck & Co Inc stock share, with VANGUARD GROUP INC the top institutional holder. As of 2024-06-30, the company held 9.6596% of the shares, roughly 244.68 million MRK shares worth $30.29 billion.
BLACKROCK INC. holds the second largest percentage of outstanding shares, with 8.1838% or 207.3 million shares worth $25.66 billion as of 2024-06-30.
Among Mutual Funds, the top two as of Dec 31, 2024 were Vanguard Total Stock Market Index Fund and Vanguard 500 Index Fund. With 79.26 shares estimated at $7.52 billion under it, the former controlled 3.14% of total outstanding shares. On the other hand, Vanguard 500 Index Fund held about 2.71% of the shares, roughly 68.48 shares worth around $6.5 billion.
