Albemarle Co. (NYSE:ALB) Shares Purchased by OVERSEA CHINESE BANKING Corp Ltd

OVERSEA CHINESE BANKING Corp Ltd raised its stake in shares of Albemarle Co. (NYSE:ALB) by 16.6% during the fourth quarter, Holdings Channel.com reports. The institutional investor owned 2,969 shares of the specialty chemicals company’s stock after buying an additional 423 shares during the period. OVERSEA CHINESE BANKING Corp Ltd’s holdings in Albemarle were worth $436,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Several other hedge funds also recently bought and sold shares of the stock. Moneta Group Investment Advisors LLC boosted its stake in shares of Albemarle by 124,405.7% during the fourth quarter. Moneta Group Investment Advisors LLC now owns 104,510,053 shares of the specialty chemicals company’s stock valued at $22,664,050,000 after acquiring an additional 104,426,113 shares during the last quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. lifted its holdings in Albemarle by 0.6% in the 1st quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 13,661,001 shares of the specialty chemicals company’s stock valued at $3,021,130,000 after purchasing an additional 75,867 shares in the last quarter. BlackRock Inc. boosted its stake in shares of Albemarle by 2.8% during the 1st quarter. BlackRock Inc. now owns 9,582,008 shares of the specialty chemicals company’s stock worth $2,118,007,000 after purchasing an additional 260,087 shares during the last quarter. State Street Corp grew its holdings in shares of Albemarle by 0.3% during the first quarter. State Street Corp now owns 5,364,655 shares of the specialty chemicals company’s stock worth $1,188,408,000 after buying an additional 16,968 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Geode Capital Management LLC raised its position in shares of Albemarle by 2.4% in the first quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 2,422,227 shares of the specialty chemicals company’s stock valued at $534,193,000 after buying an additional 57,094 shares during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 92.87% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several brokerages have weighed in on ALB. Bank of America upgraded Albemarle from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and boosted their price target for the company from $137.00 to $156.00 in a report on Wednesday, April 10th. Mizuho decreased their price target on Albemarle from $115.00 to $112.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a research note on Thursday, March 7th. Citigroup increased their price objective on shares of Albemarle from $125.00 to $135.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a report on Wednesday, April 10th. Oppenheimer dropped their price target on shares of Albemarle from $191.00 to $188.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a research report on Friday, February 16th. Finally, KeyCorp decreased their price target on shares of Albemarle from $178.00 to $159.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a report on Thursday, March 7th. Three research analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, eight have given a hold rating and ten have assigned a buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, Albemarle currently has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $175.05.

Albemarle Stock Up 0.3 %

Shares of Albemarle stock opened at $112.15 on Monday. Albemarle Co. has a 1-year low of $106.69 and a 1-year high of $247.44. The company has a market capitalization of $13.18 billion, a PE ratio of 8.41, a P/E/G ratio of 2.27 and a beta of 1.62. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.37, a current ratio of 1.47 and a quick ratio of 0.86. The business has a 50-day moving average of $123.05 and a 200-day moving average of $129.07.

Albemarle (NYSE:ALB) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, February 15th. The specialty chemicals company reported $1.85 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.99 by $0.86. Albemarle had a return on equity of 26.62% and a net margin of 16.36%. The firm had revenue of $2.36 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $2.18 billion. During the same quarter last year, the firm earned $8.62 EPS. Albemarle’s quarterly revenue was down 10.1% on a year-over-year basis. As a group, equities analysts forecast that Albemarle Co. will post 3.09 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Albemarle Announces Dividend

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, April 1st. Shareholders of record on Friday, March 15th were paid a dividend of $0.40 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Thursday, March 14th. This represents a $1.60 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.43%. Albemarle’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 11.99%.

About Albemarle

Albemarle Corporation develops, manufactures, and markets engineered specialty chemicals worldwide. It operates through three segments: Energy Storage, Specialties and Ketjen. The Energy Storage segment offers lithium compounds, including lithium carbonate, lithium hydroxide, and lithium chloride; technical services for the handling and use of reactive lithium products; and lithium-containing by-products recycling services.