What Happened?
Shares of payment technology company Marqeta (NASDAQ: MQ) fell 6.6% in the afternoon session after a price target cut from UBS overshadowed a positive earnings report from the previous day.
The analyst firm lowered its price target on Marqeta to $5.00 from $5.75 while keeping a Neutral rating on the shares. This adjustment reflected a more cautious outlook on the stock's value. The negative sentiment from the price target reduction seemed to outweigh the optimism from the prior session. Previously, the stock had jumped after the company announced strong third-quarter results. Marqeta reported that its net loss shrank by 87% to $3.6 million, and its net revenues improved by 28% year-on-year to $163 million.
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What Is The Market Telling Us
Marqeta’s shares are somewhat volatile and have had 12 moves greater than 5% over the last year. In that context, today’s move indicates the market considers this news meaningful but not something that would fundamentally change its perception of the business.
The previous big move we wrote about was 1 day ago when the stock gained 14.2% on the news that the company posted strong third-quarter financial results that beat revenue and guidance expectations.
The payment technology firm announced revenue of $163.3 million, up 27.6% year over year and comfortably ahead of the $148.8 million analysts had forecast. Its GAAP loss of $0.01 per share was in line with Wall Street expectations. Investors were also encouraged by the company's strong outlook. Marqeta guided for fourth-quarter revenue of around $167 million, which was 5.6% higher than analysts' projections. The results also showed significant operational improvements, with the operating margin improving to -6.4% from -33% in the same quarter last year.
Marqeta is up 21.7% since the beginning of the year, but at $4.54 per share, it is still trading 33.5% below its 52-week high of $6.83 from August 2025. Investors who bought $1,000 worth of Marqeta’s shares at the IPO in June 2021 would now be looking at an investment worth $148.75.
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