Impact Partnership Wealth LLC Has $486,000 Holdings in Lazard, Inc. (NYSE:LAZ)

Impact Partnership Wealth LLC boosted its stake in shares of Lazard, Inc. (NYSE:LAZ) by 78.1% during the fourth quarter, HoldingsChannel.com reports. The firm owned 9,442 shares of the asset manager’s stock after acquiring an additional 4,140 shares during the period. Impact Partnership Wealth LLC’s holdings in Lazard were worth $486,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

A number of other institutional investors and hedge funds have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the stock. Principal Financial Group Inc. increased its holdings in Lazard by 10.1% in the third quarter. Principal Financial Group Inc. now owns 2,250,049 shares of the asset manager’s stock worth $113,357,000 after buying an additional 206,295 shares during the last quarter. State Street Corp boosted its stake in shares of Lazard by 2.9% during the 3rd quarter. State Street Corp now owns 1,948,167 shares of the asset manager’s stock worth $98,149,000 after acquiring an additional 55,469 shares in the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC increased its position in Lazard by 0.8% in the 3rd quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 1,813,553 shares of the asset manager’s stock worth $91,392,000 after buying an additional 15,151 shares during the period. Fisher Asset Management LLC lifted its holdings in shares of Lazard by 2.2% during the third quarter. Fisher Asset Management LLC now owns 1,772,237 shares of the asset manager’s stock worth $89,285,000 after buying an additional 37,681 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Claro Advisors LLC boosted its position in shares of Lazard by 10,306.7% in the third quarter. Claro Advisors LLC now owns 1,235,793 shares of the asset manager’s stock valued at $62,259,000 after acquiring an additional 1,223,918 shares during the period. 54.80% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several equities analysts recently commented on the stock. Wolfe Research cut shares of Lazard from an “outperform” rating to a “peer perform” rating in a research note on Friday, January 3rd. Wells Fargo & Company cut their price objective on shares of Lazard from $59.00 to $51.00 and set an “equal weight” rating for the company in a research report on Tuesday, January 14th. UBS Group lifted their target price on Lazard from $49.00 to $52.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research report on Tuesday, October 8th. Keefe, Bruyette & Woods reduced their price objective on Lazard from $57.00 to $52.00 and set a “market perform” rating for the company in a research report on Monday, January 13th. Finally, Morgan Stanley cut shares of Lazard from an “overweight” rating to an “equal weight” rating and increased their price objective for the company from $60.00 to $63.00 in a research note on Monday, December 9th. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, six have assigned a hold rating and one has given a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, Lazard has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $53.50.

Lazard Trading Down 1.9 %

NYSE LAZ opened at $53.11 on Friday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 2.72, a quick ratio of 2.24 and a current ratio of 2.24. Lazard, Inc. has a 52 week low of $35.56 and a 52 week high of $61.14. The stock has a market capitalization of $5.99 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 21.16 and a beta of 1.40. The stock’s 50 day moving average price is $53.13 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $50.33.

Lazard (NYSE:LAZ) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, October 31st. The asset manager reported $0.38 earnings per share for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.41 by ($0.03). Lazard had a net margin of 8.28% and a return on equity of 42.20%. The business had revenue of $646.00 million during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $644.22 million. During the same quarter last year, the company posted $0.10 EPS. The firm’s revenue was up 21.4% on a year-over-year basis. As a group, analysts anticipate that Lazard, Inc. will post 2.06 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Lazard Announces Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, November 15th. Stockholders of record on Friday, November 8th were paid a dividend of $0.50 per share. The ex-dividend date was Friday, November 8th. This represents a $2.00 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 3.77%. Lazard’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is currently 79.68%.

Lazard Company Profile

Lazard, Inc, together with its subsidiaries, operates as a financial advisory and asset management firm in North and South America, Europe, the Middle East, Asia, and Australia. It operates in two segments, Financial Advisory and Asset Management. The Financial Advisory segment offers financial advisory services, such as mergers and acquisitions, capital markets, shareholder, sovereign, geopolitical advisory, and other strategic advisory services, as well as restructuring and liability management, and capital raising and placement services.