Empowered Funds LLC Boosts Stake in ArcBest Corporation $ARCB

Empowered Funds LLC grew its stake in shares of ArcBest Corporation (NASDAQ:ARCB) by 5.4% in the 2nd quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the SEC. The institutional investor owned 80,239 shares of the transportation company’s stock after buying an additional 4,123 shares during the period. Empowered Funds LLC’s holdings in ArcBest were worth $6,179,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Several other institutional investors and hedge funds have also made changes to their positions in ARCB. Envestnet Asset Management Inc. increased its position in ArcBest by 7.8% during the 1st quarter. Envestnet Asset Management Inc. now owns 40,522 shares of the transportation company’s stock worth $2,860,000 after purchasing an additional 2,925 shares in the last quarter. CWM LLC boosted its stake in shares of ArcBest by 338.8% during the 1st quarter. CWM LLC now owns 452 shares of the transportation company’s stock worth $32,000 after purchasing an additional 349 shares during the last quarter. Signaturefd LLC grew its holdings in shares of ArcBest by 477.6% during the first quarter. Signaturefd LLC now owns 387 shares of the transportation company’s stock worth $27,000 after buying an additional 320 shares in the last quarter. Readystate Asset Management LP acquired a new position in shares of ArcBest in the first quarter valued at approximately $418,000. Finally, Royce & Associates LP lifted its stake in shares of ArcBest by 15.2% during the first quarter. Royce & Associates LP now owns 98,156 shares of the transportation company’s stock valued at $6,928,000 after buying an additional 12,971 shares during the period. 99.27% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several research firms have commented on ARCB. Cowen reaffirmed a “hold” rating on shares of ArcBest in a research note on Wednesday, October 1st. JPMorgan Chase & Co. lifted their price objective on ArcBest from $85.00 to $87.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research report on Wednesday, October 8th. Citigroup upgraded ArcBest from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and upped their target price for the company from $79.00 to $89.00 in a research note on Wednesday, October 8th. UBS Group decreased their price target on ArcBest from $80.00 to $77.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a research note on Thursday, November 6th. Finally, Stephens downgraded shares of ArcBest from an “overweight” rating to an “equal weight” rating and set a $72.00 price objective for the company. in a research note on Thursday, November 6th. Six equities research analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating, eight have assigned a Hold rating and one has given a Sell rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $85.67.

ArcBest Price Performance

Shares of ArcBest stock opened at $59.62 on Friday. The business’s fifty day moving average price is $70.19 and its 200 day moving average price is $71.56. ArcBest Corporation has a twelve month low of $55.19 and a twelve month high of $115.76. The company has a current ratio of 0.96, a quick ratio of 0.96 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.13. The stock has a market capitalization of $1.34 billion, a P/E ratio of 8.87, a PEG ratio of 1.35 and a beta of 1.67.

ArcBest (NASDAQ:ARCB) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, November 5th. The transportation company reported $1.46 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $1.37 by $0.09. The company had revenue of $1.05 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.04 billion. ArcBest had a return on equity of 8.67% and a net margin of 3.90%.The firm’s revenue was down 1.4% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the prior year, the firm posted $1.64 earnings per share. As a group, research analysts anticipate that ArcBest Corporation will post 7 earnings per share for the current year.

ArcBest Announces Dividend

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, November 28th. Shareholders of record on Friday, November 14th will be given a dividend of $0.12 per share. This represents a $0.48 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 0.8%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, November 14th. ArcBest’s payout ratio is 11.40%.

ArcBest Profile

ArcBest Corporation, an integrated logistics company, engages in the provision of ground, air, and ocean transportation solutions. It operates through two segments: Asset-Based and Asset-Light. The Asset-Based segment provides less-than-truckload (LTL) services, that transports general commodities, such as food, textiles, apparel, furniture, appliances, chemicals, non-bulk petroleum products, rubber, plastics, metal and metal products, wood, glass, automotive parts, machinery, and miscellaneous manufactured products.