AMETEK (NYSE:AME) Price Target Lowered to $196.00 at Truist Financial

AMETEK (NYSE:AME) had its price objective reduced by Truist Financial from $216.00 to $196.00 in a research note released on Tuesday morning,Benzinga reports. They currently have a buy rating on the technology company’s stock.

Several other equities research analysts have also recently issued reports on the stock. BNP Paribas upgraded shares of AMETEK from a “neutral” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $210.00 price objective on the stock in a research report on Thursday, January 16th. Robert W. Baird reduced their price target on shares of AMETEK from $200.00 to $197.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a report on Wednesday, February 5th. StockNews.com raised shares of AMETEK from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a report on Thursday, April 3rd. Finally, Bank of America raised AMETEK from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and lifted their target price for the stock from $195.00 to $225.00 in a report on Monday, December 16th. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, two have issued a hold rating, eight have given a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $201.78.

AMETEK Stock Down 1.3 %

Shares of AME stock opened at $151.30 on Tuesday. The company has a market capitalization of $34.91 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 25.51, a PEG ratio of 2.73 and a beta of 1.14. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.15, a current ratio of 1.24 and a quick ratio of 0.75. The company’s fifty day moving average price is $178.67 and its 200-day moving average price is $180.47. AMETEK has a one year low of $145.02 and a one year high of $198.33.

AMETEK (NYSE:AME) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, February 4th. The technology company reported $1.87 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.85 by $0.02. AMETEK had a return on equity of 16.94% and a net margin of 19.83%. The business had revenue of $1.76 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $1.82 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the business earned $1.68 earnings per share. The business’s revenue was up 1.8% on a year-over-year basis. Sell-side analysts expect that AMETEK will post 7.15 EPS for the current fiscal year.

AMETEK Increases Dividend

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, March 31st. Stockholders of record on Friday, March 14th were issued a $0.31 dividend. This is a boost from AMETEK’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.28. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Friday, March 14th. This represents a $1.24 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.82%. AMETEK’s payout ratio is 20.91%.

AMETEK announced that its board has authorized a stock buyback plan on Friday, February 7th that authorizes the company to buyback $1.25 billion in outstanding shares. This buyback authorization authorizes the technology company to reacquire up to 2.9% of its stock through open market purchases. Stock buyback plans are generally a sign that the company’s board believes its stock is undervalued.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other news, Director Thomas A. Amato sold 710 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, March 27th. The stock was sold at an average price of $176.64, for a total value of $125,414.40. Following the sale, the director now directly owns 10,560 shares in the company, valued at approximately $1,865,318.40. This represents a 6.30 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through the SEC website. Also, Director Steven W. Kohlhagen sold 1,320 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Monday, March 3rd. The shares were sold at an average price of $189.41, for a total value of $250,021.20. Following the transaction, the director now owns 22,029 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $4,172,512.89. The trade was a 5.65 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. 0.57% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

Institutional Trading of AMETEK

Several institutional investors and hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in the business. Vanguard Group Inc. increased its stake in AMETEK by 1.1% in the 4th quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 26,147,772 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $4,713,397,000 after buying an additional 282,208 shares during the period. FMR LLC increased its position in shares of AMETEK by 1.1% during the fourth quarter. FMR LLC now owns 8,956,329 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $1,614,468,000 after acquiring an additional 98,546 shares during the period. JPMorgan Chase & Co. raised its stake in shares of AMETEK by 3.7% during the third quarter. JPMorgan Chase & Co. now owns 6,985,350 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $1,199,454,000 after acquiring an additional 250,538 shares in the last quarter. Capital World Investors boosted its holdings in shares of AMETEK by 70.0% in the fourth quarter. Capital World Investors now owns 5,760,017 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $1,038,301,000 after purchasing an additional 2,371,062 shares during the period. Finally, Geode Capital Management LLC grew its stake in AMETEK by 2.3% in the fourth quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 5,526,369 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $993,546,000 after purchasing an additional 124,713 shares in the last quarter. 87.43% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

About AMETEK

AMETEK, Inc manufactures and sells electronic instruments and electromechanical devices in the North America, Europe, Asia, and South America, and internationally. The company's EIG segment offers advanced instruments for the process, aerospace, power, and industrial markets; process and analytical instruments for the oil and gas, petrochemical, pharmaceutical, semiconductor, automation, and food and beverage industries; instruments to the laboratory equipment, ultra-precision manufacturing, medical, and test and measurement markets; power quality monitoring and c devices, uninterruptible power supplies, programmable power and electromagnetic compatibility test equipment, and sensors for gas turbines and dashboard instruments; heavy trucks, instrumentation, and controls for the food and beverage industries; and aircraft and engine sensors, power supplies, embedded computing, monitoring, fuel and fluid measurement, and data acquisition systems for aerospace and defense industry.