Beyond Meat Stock Skyrockets 74% on Revenue Beat and 2024 Plan to "Steeply" Cut Costs
Beyond Meat (NASDAQ: BYND) stock skyrocketed 73.5% in Tuesday's after-hours trading, following the plant-based meat substitute maker's release of its fourth-quarter 2023 report. This sharp rise is largely attributable to the quarter's revenue exceeding Wall Street's consensus estimate, and the company's plans to "steeply reduce" costs in 2024, in the words of CEO Ethan Brown.
These factors would not usually propel a stock up a whopping 74%, but price movements tend to be magnified for stocks with very high short interest, such as Beyond Meat. As of Jan. 31, about 36% of the company's shares outstanding were sold short. Briefly, short-sellers are betting that a stock's price will decline, and when better-than-expected news comes out, some of them will close out their short positions by buying shares.
Data source: Beyond Meat. GAAP = generally accepted accounting principles. *Calculations by author, except for revenue change, which Beyond Meat provided.
Source Fool.com
