AustralianSuper Pty Ltd Buys New Position in Smurfit Westrock PLC $SW

AustralianSuper Pty Ltd bought a new position in shares of Smurfit Westrock PLC (NYSE:SW) during the second quarter, HoldingsChannel reports. The institutional investor bought 31,334 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $1,352,000.

A number of other institutional investors and hedge funds also recently bought and sold shares of SW. Vanguard Group Inc. grew its stake in shares of Smurfit Westrock by 0.4% in the 1st quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 79,187,333 shares of the company’s stock worth $3,564,678,000 after purchasing an additional 316,074 shares during the last quarter. Nuveen LLC bought a new stake in Smurfit Westrock during the first quarter worth approximately $1,051,299,000. Invesco Ltd. grew its position in Smurfit Westrock by 4.0% in the first quarter. Invesco Ltd. now owns 10,244,072 shares of the company’s stock worth $461,598,000 after buying an additional 395,015 shares during the last quarter. Orbis Allan Gray Ltd increased its holdings in shares of Smurfit Westrock by 74.8% in the first quarter. Orbis Allan Gray Ltd now owns 10,114,213 shares of the company’s stock valued at $455,746,000 after buying an additional 4,329,653 shares in the last quarter. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. lifted its position in shares of Smurfit Westrock by 39.3% during the 1st quarter. JPMorgan Chase & Co. now owns 6,100,067 shares of the company’s stock valued at $274,869,000 after acquiring an additional 1,721,889 shares during the last quarter. 83.38% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Smurfit Westrock Trading Up 0.8%

NYSE:SW opened at $43.43 on Tuesday. The stock has a market cap of $22.67 billion, a PE ratio of 65.80 and a beta of 1.09. Smurfit Westrock PLC has a fifty-two week low of $37.01 and a fifty-two week high of $56.99. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.73, a current ratio of 1.45 and a quick ratio of 0.95. The stock’s 50-day moving average is $43.77 and its two-hundred day moving average is $43.90.

Smurfit Westrock (NYSE:SW) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, July 30th. The company reported $0.45 EPS for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $0.57 by ($0.12). Smurfit Westrock had a return on equity of 5.90% and a net margin of 1.14%.The company had revenue of $7.94 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $7.88 billion. The business’s quarterly revenue was up 167.4% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, equities research analysts forecast that Smurfit Westrock PLC will post 3.25 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Smurfit Westrock Announces Dividend

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Thursday, September 18th. Stockholders of record on Friday, August 15th were issued a dividend of $0.4308 per share. This represents a $1.72 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 4.0%. The ex-dividend date was Friday, August 15th. Smurfit Westrock’s payout ratio is currently 260.61%.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of brokerages recently issued reports on SW. Truist Financial lifted their target price on Smurfit Westrock from $54.00 to $55.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Monday, October 13th. Seaport Res Ptn upgraded Smurfit Westrock from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Monday, October 6th. UBS Group initiated coverage on Smurfit Westrock in a report on Monday, September 15th. They set a “buy” rating and a $60.00 price objective on the stock. Weiss Ratings reiterated a “hold (c)” rating on shares of Smurfit Westrock in a report on Wednesday, October 8th. Finally, Wells Fargo & Company set a $52.00 price target on shares of Smurfit Westrock and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a report on Tuesday, October 7th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, ten have given a Buy rating and one has issued a Hold rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, Smurfit Westrock presently has a consensus rating of “Buy” and a consensus target price of $57.90.

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.