Broadcom Inc (NASDAQ:AVGO) just received a price-target hike to $345 from $330 from Piper Jaffray, representing 9.5% upside from the current price of $314.98. This also stands in record-high territory for AVGO shares, which peaked at $325.67 back on Nov. 19. And with the decade about to come to the close, we looked back even further, and noticed the chipmaker has actually been one of the top S&P 500 Index (SPX) stocks over the past 10 years.
In fact, Schaeffer's Quantitative Analyst Chris Prybal just ran a study looking at SPX stocks with the highest returns over the past decade, and AVGO was fourth on the list as of Monday's close at $314.38, up 1,873.5% in the last 10 years. Interestingly, the expectations among analysts for the outperformer are rather low, based on the average 12-month price target of $324.59. We could see more price-target increases come through in the near term.
Options traders have seemingly taken defensive positions -- possibly pointing to hedging activity -- as shareholders try to protect paper profits. This is based on the Schaeffer's put/call open interest ratio (SOIR) of 1.29, a reading that ranks in the 86th annual percentile, pointing to an unusual put-skew among near-term speculators. You can see this indicator has been elevated on a relative basis since September, when the shares suffered a post-earnings pullback.
