OneDigital Investment Advisors LLC raised its stake in NIKE, Inc. by 32.8% in the second quarter, lifting its holdings to 244,296 shares after buying 60,375 additional shares. The position was worth $10,028,000 in its latest filing with the SEC.
That kind of move is why NKE stock is back on investor screens today: a new quarterly filing shows money moving into the name even as opinion around it stays split. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 64.25% of NIKE’s stock, so shifts like OneDigital’s carry weight beyond a single portfolio.
Other investors were also active. Scarborough Advisors LLC, Cornerstone Financial Management LLC, Sankala Group LLC and J.Safra Asset Management Corp each added new NIKE stakes in smaller moves, while Meeder Asset Management Inc. lifted its position by 108.4% in the first quarter to 548 shares. Those purchases do not prove a common view of the company, but they do show that some buyers were willing to add exposure while the stock drew mixed attention elsewhere.
The analyst picture was less unified. Barclays cut its price target on NIKE from $67.00 to $52.00 on Wednesday, July 1st, but kept an overweight rating. Zacks Research was more severe, cutting its view from hold to strong sell on Monday, June 1st, while Rothschild & Co Redburn later lowered its target from $45.00 to $37.00 and set a sell rating on Friday, July 17th. Stifel Nicolaus and Needham & Company LLC both stayed on hold, leaving the stock with a consensus hold rating and a consensus price target of $53.53.
That split matters because the buying and selling were happening at the same time as insider disclosures. EVP Philip Mccartney sold 17,398 shares on Friday, June 12th at an average price of $46.18, a transaction worth $803,439.64. The sale was carried out under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan and was made to cover tax withholding obligations tied to vesting equity awards, which means it was not a discretionary bet on the stock’s direction. After the sale, Mccartney still directly owned 53,133 shares valued at about $2,453,681.94, though his ownership fell by 24.67%.
That is the real friction in the filing trail: institutions were adding, an insider was selling under a preset plan, and analysts were pulling in opposite directions. COO Venkatesh Alagirisamy also sold 890 shares on Wednesday, August 5th at $41.60 for $37,024.00, extending the run of insider transactions tied to NIKE. The next piece readers will watch is whether the next round of filings shows that second-quarter buying was a one-off adjustment or the start of a larger shift in how investors are positioning around NIKE.
