Credit: Shutterstock photoPoint72 Asset Management founder Steven Cohen ( Trades , Portfolio ) initiated a 5.14% stake in fashion handbag designer Vera Bradley Inc. ( VRA ) on June 30.
Cohen's firm, which was founded in 2014 as a successor to SAC Capital Advisors, uses a bottom-up approach to identify discretionary long-short equities. Consumer cyclical, health care and energy are the three largest sectors represented in his portfolio. His current portfolio of 794 stocks is valued at $17.94 billion.
Having previously sold out of Vera Bradley in second-quarter 2016, Cohen purchased 1.8 million shares for an average price of $9.38 per share, giving it 0.1% portfolio space.
The graph below illustrates Cohen's holding history in relation to the stock price.
Headquartered in Fort Wayne, Indiana, Vera Bradley is a popular designer of women's handbags, luggage, travel items, eyewear, stationary and other accessories. The company has a market cap of $358.29 million; its shares were trading around $9.91 on Thursday with a price-earnings (P/E) ratio of 27.5, a price-book (P/B) ratio of 1.3 and a price-sales (P/S) ratio of 0.7.
The Peter Lynch chart below shows the stock is trading above its fair value.
In its fiscal first-quarter 2018 earnings report, which was released May 31, the company posted revenue of $96.1 million, down from $105.2 million in the prior-year quarter. It also reported a GAAP net loss of $4 million, or -11 cents per share, down from a net income of $2.4 million, or six cents per share, the year before.
The graph below shows the trend in the company's revenue growth since 2009.
Among the gurus invested in Vera Bradley, Mariko Gordon (Trades, Portfolio) is the largest shareholder with 8.9% of outstanding shares. Jim Simons (Trades, Portfolio), Chuck Royce (Trades, Portfolio), Barrow, Hanley, Mewhinney & Strauss, Paul Tudor Jones (Trades, Portfolio) and Joel Greenblatt (Trades, Portfolio) also own the stock.
Disclosure: I do not own the stock mentioned in the article.
This article first appeared on GuruFocus .
The views and opinions expressed herein are the views and opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of Nasdaq, Inc.
The views and opinions expressed herein are the views and opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of Nasdaq, Inc.
