Householder Group Estate & Retirement Specialist LLC Sells 842 Shares of Southwest Airlines Co. (NYSE:LUV)

Householder Group Estate & Retirement Specialist LLC lowered its holdings in Southwest Airlines Co. (NYSE:LUV) by 37.4% in the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The institutional investor owned 1,412 shares of the airline’s stock after selling 842 shares during the period. Householder Group Estate & Retirement Specialist LLC’s holdings in Southwest Airlines were worth $47,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

A number of other hedge funds have also added to or reduced their stakes in LUV. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP grew its position in Southwest Airlines by 21.6% in the second quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP now owns 5,828,166 shares of the airline’s stock valued at $166,742,000 after purchasing an additional 1,034,496 shares in the last quarter. Amalgamated Bank grew its position in Southwest Airlines by 17.0% in the second quarter. Amalgamated Bank now owns 193,732 shares of the airline’s stock valued at $5,543,000 after purchasing an additional 28,172 shares in the last quarter. Vanguard Personalized Indexing Management LLC grew its position in Southwest Airlines by 22.1% in the second quarter. Vanguard Personalized Indexing Management LLC now owns 43,238 shares of the airline’s stock valued at $1,222,000 after purchasing an additional 7,814 shares in the last quarter. XTX Topco Ltd grew its position in shares of Southwest Airlines by 224.5% in the 2nd quarter. XTX Topco Ltd now owns 31,180 shares of the airline’s stock valued at $892,000 after acquiring an additional 21,571 shares during the period. Finally, Intech Investment Management LLC bought a new position in shares of Southwest Airlines in the 2nd quarter valued at about $212,000. Institutional investors own 80.82% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

A number of research analysts have recently commented on the stock. The Goldman Sachs Group reissued a “sell” rating and issued a $28.00 price objective on shares of Southwest Airlines in a research report on Friday, November 15th. Sanford C. Bernstein lifted their price objective on shares of Southwest Airlines from $30.00 to $33.00 and gave the company a “market perform” rating in a research report on Wednesday, December 11th. Bank of America reissued an “underperform” rating and issued a $31.00 price objective (down previously from $33.00) on shares of Southwest Airlines in a research report on Friday. Morgan Stanley reissued an “overweight” rating and issued a $42.00 price objective on shares of Southwest Airlines in a research report on Wednesday, December 11th. Finally, Barclays lifted their price objective on shares of Southwest Airlines from $32.00 to $35.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research report on Friday, December 6th. Six investment analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, ten have issued a hold rating and three have assigned a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $32.31.

Southwest Airlines Price Performance

Shares of Southwest Airlines stock opened at $32.19 on Friday. Southwest Airlines Co. has a twelve month low of $23.58 and a twelve month high of $36.12. The company has a quick ratio of 0.83, a current ratio of 0.88 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.49. The company has a 50-day simple moving average of $33.02 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $30.13. The stock has a market capitalization of $19.31 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of -459.90, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.27 and a beta of 1.14.

Southwest Airlines (NYSE:LUV) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, October 24th. The airline reported $0.15 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.05 by $0.10. Southwest Airlines had a negative net margin of 0.06% and a positive return on equity of 4.56%. The business had revenue of $6.87 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $6.77 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the company earned $0.38 EPS. The business’s revenue was up 5.3% on a year-over-year basis. Analysts forecast that Southwest Airlines Co. will post 0.81 EPS for the current year.

Southwest Airlines Dividend Announcement

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Thursday, January 16th. Shareholders of record on Thursday, December 26th were issued a $0.18 dividend. This represents a $0.72 annualized dividend and a yield of 2.24%. The ex-dividend date was Thursday, December 26th. Southwest Airlines’s dividend payout ratio is currently -1,028.57%.

Insider Buying and Selling at Southwest Airlines

In related news, insider Linda B. Rutherford sold 3,849 shares of Southwest Airlines stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, December 6th. The shares were sold at an average price of $34.40, for a total transaction of $132,405.60. Following the sale, the insider now directly owns 89,376 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $3,074,534.40. The trade was a 4.13 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available through this hyperlink. Also, major shareholder Elliott Investment Management sold 1,203,920 shares of Southwest Airlines stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, October 28th. The shares were sold at an average price of $29.83, for a total transaction of $35,912,933.60. Following the sale, the insider now directly owns 59,912,580 shares in the company, valued at $1,787,192,261.40. This trade represents a 1.97 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders own 0.33% of the company’s stock.

About Southwest Airlines

Southwest Airlines Co operates as a passenger airline company that provides scheduled air transportation services in the United States and near-international markets. As of December 31, 2023, the company operated a total fleet of 817 Boeing 737 aircraft; and served 121 destinations in 42 states, the District of Columbia, and the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, as well as ten near-international countries, including Mexico, Jamaica, the Bahamas, Aruba, the Dominican Republic, Costa Rica, Belize, Cuba, the Cayman Islands, and Turks and Caicos.