Azenta (AZTA) Stock Trades Down, Here Is Why

What Happened?

Shares of life sciences company Azenta (NASDAQ:AZTA) fell 24.6% in the afternoon session after it reported mixed fourth-quarter results that failed to impress investors. 

While the company's revenue of $148.6 million was flat year over year, it did narrowly beat Wall Street's estimates. Similarly, its adjusted earnings per share of $0.14 met expectations. However, the positive notes were overshadowed by a significant miss on profitability. Azenta's adjusted EBITDA (earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization), a key measure of operational profitability, was $12.7 million, falling 29% short of the consensus forecast. The company's cash generation also weakened, with its free cash flow margin declining to 9.9% from 14.9% in the same quarter last year. Overall, the stagnant sales growth and considerable weakness in underlying profitability signaled to investors that the company's financial health was not as strong as hoped, leading to a sharp sell-off.

The stock market overreacts to news, and big price drops can present good opportunities to buy high-quality stocks. Is now the time to buy Azenta? Access our full analysis report here, it’s free.

What Is The Market Telling Us

Azenta’s shares are extremely volatile and have had 31 moves greater than 5% over the last year. But moves this big are rare even for Azenta and indicate this news significantly impacted the market’s perception of the business.

The previous big move we wrote about was 30 days ago when the stock gained 7.3% on the news that Evercore ISI Group upgraded the company's rating to "Outperform" from "In-Line" and raised its price target. 

The firm's analyst, Vijay Kumar, increased the price target on the stock to $50.00 from a previous target of $34.00. This represented a substantial change of over 47%. Such a significant upgrade and price target hike from a financial analyst often signals strong confidence in a company's future prospects, which can attract investor interest and drive up the share price.

Azenta is down 16.4% since the beginning of the year, and at $27.92 per share, it is trading 48.3% below its 52-week high of $54.04 from February 2025. Investors who bought $1,000 worth of Azenta’s shares 5 years ago would now be looking at an investment worth $348.54.

Do you want to know what moves the business you care about? Add them to your StockStory watchlist and every time a stock significantly moves, we provide you with a timely explanation straight to your inbox. It’s free and will only take you a second.