Brokerages Set Celanese Co. (NYSE:CE) PT at $61.89

Shares of Celanese Co. (NYSE:CE) have been assigned a consensus rating of “Hold” from the seventeen brokerages that are currently covering the company, MarketBeat.com reports. Two investment analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, ten have given a hold rating and five have issued a buy rating on the company. The average 12 month price objective among brokerages that have issued a report on the stock in the last year is $61.44.

A number of equities research analysts have issued reports on the company. Barclays boosted their price target on Celanese from $59.00 to $62.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research report on Wednesday, May 14th. Wells Fargo & Company increased their target price on shares of Celanese from $40.00 to $45.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a research report on Wednesday, May 7th. Evercore ISI cut their price target on shares of Celanese from $85.00 to $75.00 and set an “in-line” rating on the stock in a report on Monday, March 24th. UBS Group dropped their price objective on shares of Celanese from $60.00 to $46.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a research report on Monday, April 7th. Finally, Royal Bank of Canada lowered shares of Celanese from an “outperform” rating to a “sector perform” rating and reduced their target price for the company from $84.00 to $56.00 in a report on Thursday, February 20th.

Celanese Price Performance

Celanese stock opened at $53.56 on Wednesday. Celanese has a 1 year low of $36.29 and a 1 year high of $157.74. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.98, a quick ratio of 0.76 and a current ratio of 1.34. The firm has a 50 day moving average price of $48.41 and a 200 day moving average price of $62.15. The company has a market cap of $5.86 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of -3.84, a PEG ratio of 1.05 and a beta of 1.09.

Celanese (NYSE:CE) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Monday, May 5th. The basic materials company reported $0.57 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.37 by $0.20. The company had revenue of $2.39 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $2.26 billion. Celanese had a negative net margin of 14.81% and a positive return on equity of 12.86%. Celanese’s revenue for the quarter was down 8.5% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter last year, the business earned $2.08 EPS. Sell-side analysts predict that Celanese will post 8.79 earnings per share for the current year.

Celanese Dividend Announcement

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, May 12th. Stockholders of record on Monday, April 28th were given a dividend of $0.03 per share. This represents a $0.12 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.22%. The ex-dividend date was Monday, April 28th. Celanese’s payout ratio is currently -0.79%.

Institutional Trading of Celanese

Hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in the stock. Barclays PLC raised its stake in shares of Celanese by 14.0% in the 3rd quarter. Barclays PLC now owns 281,709 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $38,300,000 after purchasing an additional 34,658 shares in the last quarter. Principal Financial Group Inc. increased its holdings in Celanese by 11.8% in the third quarter. Principal Financial Group Inc. now owns 128,201 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $17,430,000 after buying an additional 13,503 shares during the last quarter. Czech National Bank raised its stake in Celanese by 6.5% during the fourth quarter. Czech National Bank now owns 23,706 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $1,641,000 after buying an additional 1,448 shares in the last quarter. Matrix Trust Co lifted its holdings in Celanese by 1,186.2% during the 4th quarter. Matrix Trust Co now owns 1,402 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $97,000 after buying an additional 1,293 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Wedmont Private Capital bought a new stake in shares of Celanese in the 4th quarter valued at approximately $286,000. Institutional investors own 98.87% of the company’s stock.

Celanese Company Profile

Celanese Corporation, a chemical and specialty materials company, manufactures and sells high performance engineered polymers in the United States and internationally. It operates through Engineered Materials and Acetyl Chain. The Engineered Materials segment develops, produces, and supplies specialty polymers for automotive and medical applications, as well as for use in industrial products and consumer electronics.