How to buy NOW stock | 5.16

NOW Inc is an oil & gas equipment & services business based in the US. NOW shares (DNOW) are listed on the NYSE and all prices are listed in US Dollars. NOW employs 3,000 staff and has a trailing 12-month revenue of around USD$2.4 billion.

How to buy shares in NOW

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 NOW. Find the stock by name or ticker symbol: DNOW. 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 NOW 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$5.16, 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 NOW, depending on your broker.
6. Check in on your investment. Congratulations, you own a part of NOW. 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 NOW's share price?

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

Its last market close was USD$5.16, which is 45.86% down on its pre-crash value of USD$9.53 and 27.41% up on the lowest point reached during the March crash when the shares fell as low as USD$4.05.

If you had bought USD$1,000 worth of NOW shares at the start of February 2020, those shares would have been worth USD$555.65 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$512.90.

NOW share price

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

NOW shares at a glance

• Key figures

Information last updated 2020-10-21.

Latest market close	USD$5.16
52-week range	USD$4.385 - USD$12.745
50-day moving average	USD$5.516
200-day moving average	USD$7.0652
Wall St. target price	USD$8.81
PE ratio	22.3317
Dividend yield	N/A (0%)
Earnings per share (TTM)	USD$0.527

Compare trading platforms

Compare special offers, low fees and a wide range of types of investments among top trading platforms.

Is it a good time to buy NOW 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 NOW 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.

NOW price performance over time

Historical closes compared with the close of $5.16 from 2020-10-19

1 week (2020-10-16)	-4.62%
1 month (2020-09-25)	7.28%
3 months (2020-07-24)	-40.96%
6 months (2020-04-24)	-8.67%

1 year (2019-10-25)	-51.96%
2 years (2018-10-25)	-59.97%
3 years (2017-10-25)	-57.53%
5 years (2015-10-23)	-68.88%

Is NOW under- or over-valued?

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

NOW's P/E ratio

NOW's current share price divided by its per-share earnings (EPS) over a 12-month period gives a "trailing price/earnings ratio" of roughly 22x. In other words, NOW shares trade at around 22x 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.

NOW's EBITDA

NOW's EBITDA (earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortisation) is USD$15 million.

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

NOW financials

Revenue TTM	USD$2.4 billion
Gross profit TTM	USD$586 million
Return on assets TTM	-0.99%
Return on equity TTM	-48.73%
Profit margin	-20.73%
Book value	$6.829
Market capitalisation	USD$569.9 million

TTM: trailing 12 months

Shorting NOW shares

There are currently 1.6 million NOW shares held short by investors – that's known as NOW's "short interest". This figure is 38% down from 2.6 million last month.

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

NOW's "short interest ratio" (SIR)

NOW's "short interest ratio" (SIR) is the quantity of NOW shares currently shorted divided by the average quantity of NOW shares traded daily (recently around 1.7 million). NOW's SIR currently stands at 0.93. In other words for every 100,000 NOW shares traded daily on the market, roughly 930 shares are currently held short.

However NOW's short interest can also be evaluated against the total number of NOW shares, or, against the total number of tradable NOW shares (the shares that aren't held by "insiders" or major long-term shareholders – also known as the "float"). In this case NOW's short interest could be expressed as 0.01% of the outstanding shares (for every 100,000 NOW shares in existence, roughly 10 shares are currently held short) or 0.0168% of the tradable shares (for every 100,000 tradable NOW shares, roughly 17 shares are currently held short).

Such a low SIR usually points to an optimistic outlook for the share price, with fewer people currently willing to bet against NOW.

Find out more about how you can short NOW stock.

NOW share dividends

We're not expecting NOW to pay a dividend over the next 12 months.

NOW share price volatility

Over the last 12 months, NOW's shares have ranged in value from as little as $4.385 up to $12.745. 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 NOW's is 1.9112. This would suggest that NOW's shares are more volatile than the average for this exchange and represent, relatively-speaking, a higher risk (but potentially also market-beating returns).

NOW overview

NOW Inc. distributes downstream energy and industrial products for petroleum refining, chemical processing, LNG terminals, power generation utilities, and industrial manufacturing operations in the United States, Canada, and internationally. The company offers its products under the DistributionNOW and DNOW brand names. It provides consumable maintenance, repair, and operating supplies; pipes, valves, fittings, flanges, gaskets, fasteners, electrical products, instrumentations, artificial lift, pumping solutions, valve actuation and modular process, and measurement and control equipment; and mill supplies, tools, safety supplies, and personal protective equipment, as well as applied products and applications, such as artificial lift systems, coatings, and miscellaneous expendable items. The company also offers machine, cutting, power, and hand tools; original equipment manufacturer equipment, including pumps, generator sets, air and gas compressors, dryers, and blowers and valves; modular oil and gas tank battery solutions; and application systems, work processes, parts integration, optimization solutions, and after-sales support. In addition, it provides supply chain and materials management solutions that include procurement, inventory, and warehouse management, as well as solutions for logistics, point of issue technology, project management, business process, and performance metrics reporting. The company serves customers in the upstream, midstream, and downstream sectors of the energy industry, including drilling contractors, well servicing companies, independent and national oil and gas companies, midstream operators, and refineries, as well as petrochemical, chemical, utilities, and other downstream energy processors; and industrial and manufacturing companies. NOW Inc. was incorporated in 2013 and is headquartered in Houston, Texas.

Frequently asked questions

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

  Currently 1.321% of NOW shares are held by insiders and 102.154% by institutions.

• How many people work for NOW?

  Latest data suggests 3,000 work at NOW.

• When does the fiscal year end for NOW?

  NOW's fiscal year ends in December.

• Where is NOW based?

  NOW's address is: 7402 North Eldridge Parkway, Houston, TX, United States, 77041

• What is NOW's ISIN number?

  NOW's international securities identification number is: US67011P1003

• What is NOW's CUSIP number?

  NOW's Committee on Uniform Securities Identification Procedures number is: 67011P100