B. Metzler seel. Sohn & Co. AG Increases Stock Position in Reliance, Inc. (NYSE:RS)

B. Metzler seel. Sohn & Co. AG grew its stake in Reliance, Inc. (NYSE:RS) by 116.6% in the fourth quarter, Holdings Channel.com reports. The institutional investor owned 4,748 shares of the industrial products company’s stock after buying an additional 2,556 shares during the quarter. B. Metzler seel. Sohn & Co. AG’s holdings in Reliance were worth $1,278,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

A number of other institutional investors have also recently made changes to their positions in RS. Wellington Management Group LLP grew its position in Reliance by 10.4% in the fourth quarter. Wellington Management Group LLP now owns 1,479,542 shares of the industrial products company’s stock worth $398,381,000 after acquiring an additional 138,866 shares in the last quarter. Pacer Advisors Inc. boosted its holdings in shares of Reliance by 6,311.2% in the 4th quarter. Pacer Advisors Inc. now owns 816,465 shares of the industrial products company’s stock worth $219,841,000 after purchasing an additional 803,730 shares in the last quarter. Principal Financial Group Inc. increased its position in shares of Reliance by 53.5% during the 4th quarter. Principal Financial Group Inc. now owns 725,685 shares of the industrial products company’s stock valued at $195,402,000 after purchasing an additional 252,955 shares during the last quarter. Boston Partners raised its holdings in shares of Reliance by 7.6% during the 4th quarter. Boston Partners now owns 716,280 shares of the industrial products company’s stock valued at $192,894,000 after buying an additional 50,528 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Norges Bank bought a new stake in Reliance in the 4th quarter worth approximately $186,255,000. Institutional investors own 79.26% of the company’s stock.

Insider Buying and Selling

In related news, CEO Karla R. Lewis sold 31,136 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Monday, February 24th. The shares were sold at an average price of $300.52, for a total value of $9,356,990.72. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer now directly owns 90,230 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $27,115,919.60. This represents a 25.65 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this link. 0.69% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.

Reliance Price Performance

Shares of Reliance stock opened at $275.66 on Friday. The company’s fifty day simple moving average is $288.88 and its two-hundred day simple moving average is $290.74. Reliance, Inc. has a 12-month low of $256.98 and a 12-month high of $342.20. The firm has a market cap of $14.60 billion, a PE ratio of 17.85 and a beta of 0.87. The company has a quick ratio of 1.58, a current ratio of 3.21 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.10.

Reliance (NYSE:RS) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, February 19th. The industrial products company reported $2.22 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.74 by ($0.52). The business had revenue of $3.13 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $3.04 billion. Reliance had a net margin of 6.33% and a return on equity of 11.87%. As a group, equities analysts expect that Reliance, Inc. will post 16.98 EPS for the current year.

Reliance Increases Dividend

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, March 21st. Investors of record on Friday, March 7th were issued a dividend of $1.20 per share. This represents a $4.80 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 1.74%. The ex-dividend date was Friday, March 7th. This is an increase from Reliance’s previous quarterly dividend of $1.10. Reliance’s dividend payout ratio is currently 31.09%.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several research analysts have commented on RS shares. KeyCorp lifted their price target on shares of Reliance from $321.00 to $327.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Monday, February 24th. Wolfe Research upgraded shares of Reliance from an “underperform” rating to a “peer perform” rating in a research report on Wednesday, January 8th. Five investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and two have assigned a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $329.17.

Reliance Profile

Reliance, Inc operates as a diversified metal solutions provider and the metals service center company in the United States, Canada, and internationally. The company distributes a line of approximately 100,000 metal products, including alloy, aluminum, brass, copper, carbon steel, stainless steel, titanium, and specialty steel products; and provides metals processing services to general manufacturing, non-residential construction, transportation, aerospace, energy, electronics and semiconductor fabrication, and heavy industries.