Victory Capital Management Inc. Grows Stake in The Toro Company (NYSE:TTC)

Victory Capital Management Inc. increased its stake in The Toro Company (NYSE:TTC) by 693.0% in the 4th quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The institutional investor owned 414,961 shares of the company’s stock after acquiring an additional 362,634 shares during the period. Victory Capital Management Inc.’s holdings in Toro were worth $33,238,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Several other institutional investors and hedge funds also recently added to or reduced their stakes in TTC. Asset Planning Inc purchased a new position in Toro in the fourth quarter worth about $31,000. Venturi Wealth Management LLC grew its position in Toro by 195.7% in the fourth quarter. Venturi Wealth Management LLC now owns 547 shares of the company’s stock worth $44,000 after acquiring an additional 362 shares in the last quarter. First Horizon Advisors Inc. grew its position in Toro by 54.6% in the fourth quarter. First Horizon Advisors Inc. now owns 807 shares of the company’s stock worth $65,000 after acquiring an additional 285 shares in the last quarter. PrairieView Partners LLC grew its position in Toro by 14.7% in the fourth quarter. PrairieView Partners LLC now owns 1,547 shares of the company’s stock worth $123,000 after acquiring an additional 198 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Eagle Bay Advisors LLC grew its position in Toro by 87.2% in the fourth quarter. Eagle Bay Advisors LLC now owns 1,657 shares of the company’s stock worth $133,000 after acquiring an additional 772 shares in the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 87.95% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

TTC has been the subject of several recent analyst reports. Northland Securities upgraded Toro from a “market perform” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $100.00 target price for the company in a research report on Monday, February 24th. StockNews.com lowered Toro from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Friday. Raymond James dropped their target price on Toro from $100.00 to $95.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a research report on Friday, December 20th. Northland Capmk upgraded Toro from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Friday, February 21st. Finally, Robert W. Baird dropped their target price on Toro from $88.00 to $84.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a research report on Friday. Three research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, two have issued a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, Toro currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $91.75.

Toro Stock Down 1.0 %

Shares of NYSE TTC opened at $73.44 on Monday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.59, a quick ratio of 0.74 and a current ratio of 1.81. The firm has a market capitalization of $7.39 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 18.31 and a beta of 0.70. The stock has a 50 day moving average price of $80.94 and a 200 day moving average price of $83.50. The Toro Company has a 52-week low of $72.18 and a 52-week high of $100.93.

Toro (NYSE:TTC) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, December 18th. The company reported $0.95 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, meeting analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.95. The firm had revenue of $1.08 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.09 billion. Toro had a return on equity of 27.25% and a net margin of 9.14%. Toro’s quarterly revenue was up 9.4% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the previous year, the business earned $0.71 earnings per share. Sell-side analysts expect that The Toro Company will post 4.41 earnings per share for the current year.

Toro Increases Dividend

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, January 13th. Investors of record on Monday, December 23rd were issued a $0.38 dividend. This is a positive change from Toro’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.36. The ex-dividend date was Monday, December 23rd. This represents a $1.52 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 2.07%. Toro’s payout ratio is presently 38.87%.

Toro declared that its Board of Directors has approved a share repurchase program on Tuesday, December 10th that allows the company to repurchase 4,000,000 shares. This repurchase authorization allows the company to reacquire shares of its stock through open market purchases. Shares repurchase programs are typically a sign that the company’s leadership believes its stock is undervalued.

Toro Profile

The Toro Company designs, manufactures, markets, and sells professional turf maintenance equipment and services. It operates through two segments: Professional and Residential. The Professional segment offers turf and landscape equipment products, including sports fields and grounds mowing and maintenance equipment, golf course mowing and maintenance equipment, landscape contractor mowing equipment, landscape creation and renovation equipment, and other maintenance equipment; rental, specialty, and underground construction equipment, such as horizontal directional drills, walk and ride trenchers, stand-on skid steers, vacuum excavators, stump grinders, turf renovation products, asset locators, pipe rehabilitation solutions, materials handling equipment, and other after-market tools; and snow and ice management equipment, such as snowplows, as well as stand-on snow and ice removal equipment, such as snowplow, snow brush, and snow thrower attachments, salt and sand spreaders, and related parts and accessories for light and medium duty trucks, utility task vehicles, skid steers, and front-end loaders.