Mirae Asset Global Investments Co. Ltd. Increases Stock Position in Smurfit Westrock PLC $SW

Mirae Asset Global Investments Co. Ltd. lifted its position in shares of Smurfit Westrock PLC (NYSE:SW) by 27.9% during the fourth quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The institutional investor owned 90,679 shares of the company’s stock after purchasing an additional 19,788 shares during the period. Mirae Asset Global Investments Co. Ltd.’s holdings in Smurfit Westrock were worth $3,507,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

A number of other large investors also recently made changes to their positions in SW. Orbis Allan Gray Ltd lifted its position in shares of Smurfit Westrock by 81.9% during the second quarter. Orbis Allan Gray Ltd now owns 18,400,418 shares of the company’s stock valued at $793,978,000 after purchasing an additional 8,286,205 shares in the last quarter. UBS Group AG lifted its position in shares of Smurfit Westrock by 272.0% during the third quarter. UBS Group AG now owns 11,240,153 shares of the company’s stock valued at $478,493,000 after purchasing an additional 8,218,351 shares in the last quarter. Franklin Resources Inc. lifted its position in shares of Smurfit Westrock by 94.4% during the third quarter. Franklin Resources Inc. now owns 11,353,140 shares of the company’s stock valued at $482,917,000 after purchasing an additional 5,511,887 shares in the last quarter. Barclays PLC lifted its position in shares of Smurfit Westrock by 152.2% during the third quarter. Barclays PLC now owns 5,269,743 shares of the company’s stock valued at $224,333,000 after purchasing an additional 3,180,531 shares in the last quarter. Finally, State Street Corp lifted its position in shares of Smurfit Westrock by 14.6% during the third quarter. State Street Corp now owns 23,806,914 shares of the company’s stock valued at $1,013,474,000 after purchasing an additional 3,027,125 shares in the last quarter. 83.38% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of research analysts recently weighed in on the stock. Barclays dropped their price target on shares of Smurfit Westrock from $56.00 to $54.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a research report on Wednesday, April 1st. Morgan Stanley dropped their price target on shares of Smurfit Westrock from $61.00 to $60.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a research report on Friday, March 6th. Royal Bank Of Canada set a $54.00 price target on shares of Smurfit Westrock and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research report on Thursday, April 16th. Jefferies Financial Group set a $58.00 price target on shares of Smurfit Westrock in a research report on Thursday, February 12th. Finally, Truist Financial dropped their price target on shares of Smurfit Westrock from $60.00 to $53.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research report on Wednesday, April 15th. Eleven investment analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating, one has assigned a Hold rating and one has issued a Sell rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat, Smurfit Westrock has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $53.91.

Smurfit Westrock Stock Performance

Shares of SW stock opened at $41.24 on Wednesday. The firm has a market cap of $21.62 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 31.00 and a beta of 1.06. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.73, a quick ratio of 0.95 and a current ratio of 1.48. Smurfit Westrock PLC has a 52 week low of $32.73 and a 52 week high of $52.65. The firm’s 50-day simple moving average is $43.10 and its two-hundred day simple moving average is $40.63.

Smurfit Westrock (NYSE:SW) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Friday, February 27th. The company reported $0.34 EPS for the quarter. The business had revenue of $7.58 billion for the quarter. Smurfit Westrock had a net margin of 2.24% and a return on equity of 6.10%. As a group, equities analysts forecast that Smurfit Westrock PLC will post 2.59 earnings per share for the current year.

Smurfit Westrock Increases Dividend

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, March 18th. Shareholders of record on Tuesday, February 17th were given a $0.4523 dividend. This is a positive change from Smurfit Westrock’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.43. This represents a $1.81 annualized dividend and a yield of 4.4%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Tuesday, February 17th. Smurfit Westrock’s payout ratio is presently 136.09%.

Insider Activity

In other Smurfit Westrock news, CEO Anthony P. J. Smurfit sold 40,000 shares of Smurfit Westrock stock in a transaction dated Thursday, February 19th. The shares were sold at an average price of $51.54, for a total value of $2,061,600.00. Following the sale, the chief executive officer owned 1,642,610 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $84,660,119.40. The trade was a 2.38% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is accessible through this link. Also, CFO Ken Bowles sold 10,000 shares of Smurfit Westrock stock in a transaction dated Thursday, February 19th. The stock was sold at an average price of $51.26, for a total transaction of $512,600.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief financial officer directly owned 151,644 shares in the company, valued at approximately $7,773,271.44. This represents a 6.19% decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale is available in the SEC filing. Insiders own 0.46% of the company’s stock.

About Smurfit Westrock

Smurfit Westrock Plc, together with its subsidiaries, manufactures, distributes, and sells containerboard, corrugated containers, and other paper-based packaging products in Ireland and internationally. The company produces containerboard that it converts into corrugated containers or sells to third parties, as well as produces other types of paper, such as consumer packaging board, sack paper, graphic paper, solid board and graphic board, and other paper-based packaging products, such as consumer packaging, solid board packaging, paper sacks, and other packaging products, including bag-in-box.