How to buy Medifast stock | 155.99

Medifast, Inc is a personal services business based in the US. Medifast shares (MED) are listed on the NYSE and all prices are listed in US Dollars. Medifast employs 550 staff and has a trailing 12-month revenue of around USD$759.2 million.

How to buy shares in Medifast

1. Compare share trading platforms. If you're a beginner, look for a platform with low commissions, expert ratings and investment tools to track your portfolio. Narrow down top brands with our comparison table.
2. Open and fund your brokerage account. Complete an application with your personal and financial details, like your ID and bank information. Fund your account with a bank transfer, credit card or debit card.
3. Search for Medifast. Find the stock by name or ticker symbol: MED. Research its history to confirm it's a solid investment against your financial goals.
4. Purchase now or later. Buy today with a market order or use a limit order to delay your purchase until Medifast reaches your desired price. To spread out your purchase, look into dollar-cost averaging, which smooths out buying at consistent intervals and amounts.
5. Decide on how many to buy. At last close price of USD$155.99, weigh your budget against a diversified portfolio that can minimize risk through the market's ups and downs. You may be able to buy a fractional share of Medifast, depending on your broker.
6. Check in on your investment. Congratulations, you own a part of Medifast. Optimize your portfolio by tracking how your stock — and even the business — performs with an eye on the long term. You may be eligible for dividends and shareholder voting rights on directors and management that can affect your stock.

How has coronavirus impacted Medifast's share price?

Since the stock market crash in March caused by coronavirus, Medifast's share price has had significant positive movement.

Its last market close was USD$155.99, which is 38.47% up on its pre-crash value of USD$95.98 and 218.15% up on the lowest point reached during the March crash when the shares fell as low as USD$49.03.

If you had bought USD$1,000 worth of Medifast shares at the start of February 2020, those shares would have been worth USD$565.36 at the bottom of the March crash, and if you held on to them, then as of the last market close they'd be worth USD$1,580.18.

Medifast share price

Use our graph to track the performance of MED stocks over time.

Medifast shares at a glance

• Key figures

Information last updated 2020-10-20.

Latest market close	USD$155.99
52-week range	USD$49.03 - USD$184.29
50-day moving average	USD$166.962
200-day moving average	USD$132.7194
Wall St. target price	USD$190
PE ratio	25.45
Dividend yield	USD$4.52 (2.9%)
Earnings per share (TTM)	USD$6.392

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Is it a good time to buy Medifast stock?

The technical analysis gauge below displays real-time ratings for the timeframes you select. This is not a recommendation, however. It represents a technical analysis based on the most popular technical indicators: Moving Averages, Oscillators and Pivots. Finder might not concur and takes no responsibility.

Technical Analysis of Medifast, Inc by TradingView

This chart is not advice or a guarantee of success. Rather, it gauges the real-time recommendations of three popular technical indicators: moving averages, oscillators and pivots. Finder is not responsible for how your stock performs.

Medifast price performance over time

Historical closes compared with the close of $155.99 from 2020-10-16

1 week (2020-10-16)	155.99
1 month (2020-09-25)	-5.40%
3 months (2020-07-24)	-3.78%
6 months (2020-04-24)	125.68%

1 year (2019-10-25)	43.16%
2 years (2018-10-25)	-24.47%
3 years (2017-10-25)	145.31%
5 years (2015-10-23)	439.76%

Is Medifast under- or over-valued?

Valuing Medifast stock is incredibly difficult, and any metric has to be viewed as part of a bigger picture of Medifast's overall performance. However, analysts commonly use some key metrics to help gauge the value of a stock.

Medifast's P/E ratio

Medifast's current share price divided by its per-share earnings (EPS) over a 12-month period gives a "trailing price/earnings ratio" of roughly 25x. In other words, Medifast shares trade at around 25x recent earnings.

That's relatively low compared to, say, the trailing 12-month P/E ratio for the NASDAQ 100 at the end of 2019 (27.29). The low P/E ratio could mean that investors are pessimistic about the outlook for the shares or simply that they're under-valued.

Medifast's PEG ratio

Medifast's "price/earnings-to-growth ratio" can be calculated by dividing its P/E ratio by its growth – to give 1.95. A low ratio can be interpreted as meaning the shares offer better value, while a higher ratio can be interpreted as meaning the shares offer worse value.

The PEG ratio provides a broader view than just the P/E ratio, as it gives more insight into Medifast's future profitability. By accounting for growth, it could also help you if you're comparing the share prices of multiple high-growth companies.

Medifast's EBITDA

Medifast's EBITDA (earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortisation) is USD$96.7 million.

The EBITDA is a measure of a Medifast's overall financial performance and is widely used to measure a its profitability.

Medifast financials

Revenue TTM	USD$759.2 million
Operating margin TTM	12.1%
Gross profit TTM	USD$536.9 million
Return on assets TTM	25.82%
Return on equity TTM	62.77%
Profit margin	10.04%
Book value	$9.972
Market capitalisation	USD$1.8 billion

TTM: trailing 12 months

Shorting Medifast shares

There are currently 955,046 Medifast shares held short by investors – that's known as Medifast's "short interest". This figure is 0.8% down from 962,366 last month.

There are a few different ways that this level of interest in shorting Medifast shares can be evaluated.

Medifast's "short interest ratio" (SIR)

Medifast's "short interest ratio" (SIR) is the quantity of Medifast shares currently shorted divided by the average quantity of Medifast shares traded daily (recently around 189869.98011928). Medifast's SIR currently stands at 5.03. In other words for every 100,000 Medifast shares traded daily on the market, roughly 5030 shares are currently held short.

However Medifast's short interest can also be evaluated against the total number of Medifast shares, or, against the total number of tradable Medifast shares (the shares that aren't held by "insiders" or major long-term shareholders – also known as the "float"). In this case Medifast's short interest could be expressed as 0.08% of the outstanding shares (for every 100,000 Medifast shares in existence, roughly 80 shares are currently held short) or 0.1174% of the tradable shares (for every 100,000 tradable Medifast shares, roughly 117 shares are currently held short).

A SIR below 10% would generally be considered to indicate a fairly optimistic outlook for the share price, with fewer people currently willing to bet against Medifast.

Find out more about how you can short Medifast stock.

Medifast share dividends

Dividend payout ratio: 65.79% of net profits

Recently Medifast has paid out, on average, around 65.79% of net profits as dividends. That has enabled analysts to estimate a "forward annual dividend yield" of 2.9% of the current stock value. This means that over a year, based on recent payouts (which are sadly no guarantee of future payouts), Medifast shareholders could enjoy a 2.9% return on their shares, in the form of dividend payments. In Medifast's case, that would currently equate to about $4.52 per share.

Medifast's payout ratio would broadly be considered high, and as such this stock could appeal to those looking to generate an income. Bear in mind however that companies should normally also look to re-invest a decent amount of net profits to ensure future growth.

Medifast's most recent dividend payout was on 6 November 2020. The latest dividend was paid out to all shareholders who bought their shares by 21 September 2020 (the "ex-dividend date").

Medifast share price volatility

Over the last 12 months, Medifast's shares have ranged in value from as little as $49.03 up to $184.29. A popular way to gauge a stock's volatility is its "beta".

Beta is a measure of a share's volatility in relation to the market. The market (NYSE average) beta is 1, while Medifast's is 1.2041. This would suggest that Medifast's shares are a little bit more volatile than the average for this exchange and represent, relatively-speaking, a slightly higher risk (but potentially also market-beating returns).

Medifast overview

Medifast, Inc., through its subsidiaries, manufactures and distributes weight loss, weight management, healthy living products, and other consumable health and nutritional products in the United States and the Asia-Pacific. It offers bars, bites, pretzels, puffs, oatmeal and cereal crunch products, drinks, hearty choices, pancakes, puddings, soft serves, shakes, smoothies, soft bakes, and soups under the Medifast, OPTAVIA, Thrive by Medifast, Optimal Health by Take Shape for Life, and Flavors of Home brands. The company markets its products through direct ecommerce platform and franchise weight control center channels. Medifast, Inc. was founded in 1980 and is headquartered in Baltimore, Maryland.

Frequently asked questions

• What percentage of Medifast is owned by insiders or institutions?

  Currently 4.652% of Medifast shares are held by insiders and 115.356% by institutions.

• How many people work for Medifast?

  Latest data suggests 550 work at Medifast.

• When does the fiscal year end for Medifast?

  Medifast's fiscal year ends in December.

• Where is Medifast based?

  Medifast's address is: 100 International Drive, Baltimore, MD, United States, 21202

• What is Medifast's ISIN number?

  Medifast's international securities identification number is: US58470H1014

• What is Medifast's CUSIP number?

  Medifast's Committee on Uniform Securities Identification Procedures number is: 42221F101