No less than five analysts upgraded or raised their price targets on THC
Tenet Healthcare Corp (NYSE:THC) stock is up 7.8% to trade at $79.88 this morning, following a round of post-earnings upgrades. On Monday after the close, the company reported fourth-quarter earnings that beat Wall Street's estimates, and while it took a few days for analysts to chime in, no less than five firms have since upgraded and/or raised their price targets on Tenet Healthcare stock.
Digging deeper, Truist Securities upgraded THC to "buy" from "hold," while Deutsche Bank hiked its price objective to $100 from $80. Elsewhere, RBC and Credit Suisse raised their price targets to $89 and $111, respectively, while SVB Leerink chimed in with a bull note that included an upgrade to "outperform" and a price-target raise to $100. There's ample room for more covering brokerages to follow suit, too. Coming into today, five of the 14 analysts in coverage considered the stock a "hold."
Call traders are in a frenzy following the bull notes. The equity's normally quiet options pits have seen 1,161 calls cross the tape in the first half hour of trading, which is three times what's typically seen at this point. Most popular is the February 80 call, followed by the 85 call in the same series.
Options traders were already bullish. This is according to THC's 50-day call/put volume ratio of 4.66 at the International Securities Exchange (ISE), Cboe Options Exchange (CBOE), and NASDAQ OMX PHLX (PHLX), which stands higher than all but 2% of readings in its annual range. In other words, long calls have been picked up at a quicker-than-usual rate during the past 10 weeks.
Investors might want to consider speculating on Tenet stock's next move with options since the stock's Schaeffer's Volatility Index (SVI) of 40% ranks higher than just 15% of reading from the past 12 months. This means options players are pricing in relatively low volatility expectations for THC at present.
On the charts, Tenet Healthcare stock is chipping away at its 2% year-to-date deficit, while the 40-day moving average is once again acting as a floor. Longer term, THC boasts a 55.3% year-over-year lead, staging a bounce off long-term support near its 200-day moving average earlier in the week.