Public Employees Retirement System of Ohio Purchases Shares of 790,751 Tower Semiconductor Ltd. $TSEM

Public Employees Retirement System of Ohio purchased a new position in shares of Tower Semiconductor Ltd. (NASDAQ:TSEM) during the 2nd quarter, Holdings Channel reports. The fund purchased 790,751 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock, valued at approximately $377,639,000. Tower Semiconductor makes up approximately 1.1% of Public Employees Retirement System of Ohio’s investment portfolio, making the stock its 12th largest holding.

Other institutional investors and hedge funds have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Swiss National Bank grew its stake in Tower Semiconductor by 86.0% in the first quarter. Swiss National Bank now owns 414,850 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock valued at $70,625,000 after purchasing an additional 191,839 shares in the last quarter. Pier Capital LLC raised its stake in shares of Tower Semiconductor by 31.4% during the 4th quarter. Pier Capital LLC now owns 67,520 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock worth $7,928,000 after purchasing an additional 16,116 shares in the last quarter. Empowered Funds LLC acquired a new stake in shares of Tower Semiconductor in the 1st quarter valued at approximately $754,000. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. boosted its holdings in shares of Tower Semiconductor by 4.4% in the 2nd quarter. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. now owns 118,406 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock valued at $30,378,000 after buying an additional 4,965 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Altshuler Shaham Ltd grew its stake in shares of Tower Semiconductor by 1,175.6% in the first quarter. Altshuler Shaham Ltd now owns 340,108 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock valued at $58,025,000 after buying an additional 313,445 shares in the last quarter. 70.51% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Insider Buying and Selling at Tower Semiconductor

In other news, CEO Russell Craig Ellwanger sold 104,226 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, August 11th. The shares were sold at an average price of $248.34, for a total value of $25,883,484.84. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer directly owned 526,788 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $130,822,531.92. This represents a 16.52% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this link. 1.00% of the stock is owned by insiders.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of equities analysts recently weighed in on the stock. Barclays upgraded shares of Tower Semiconductor from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a report on Thursday, August 20th. UBS Group reissued a “buy” rating on shares of Tower Semiconductor in a research report on Wednesday, July 15th. Bank of America initiated coverage on shares of Tower Semiconductor in a research report on Friday, August 7th. They issued a “buy” rating and a $367.00 price objective for the company. National Bank Financial upgraded shares of Tower Semiconductor to a “buy” rating in a research note on Friday, August 7th. Finally, Susquehanna raised their target price on shares of Tower Semiconductor from $180.00 to $330.00 and gave the company a “positive” rating in a research note on Thursday, May 14th. One research analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, five have assigned a Buy rating and two have assigned a Hold rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, Tower Semiconductor has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $294.80.

Tower Semiconductor Stock Down 0.6%

TSEM stock opened at $219.85 on Friday. Tower Semiconductor Ltd. has a 1-year low of $56.54 and a 1-year high of $319.94. The business’s 50 day simple moving average is $238.76 and its 200 day simple moving average is $211.71. The company has a current ratio of 4.91, a quick ratio of 4.31 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.04. The firm has a market capitalization of $24.72 billion, a PE ratio of 86.90 and a beta of 0.90.

Tower Semiconductor (NASDAQ:TSEM) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, August 4th. The semiconductor company reported $0.88 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.76 by $0.12. Tower Semiconductor had a return on equity of 9.83% and a net margin of 16.94%.The business had revenue of $460.08 million during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $454.68 million. During the same quarter last year, the firm posted $0.41 EPS. The company’s quarterly revenue was up 23.7% on a year-over-year basis. As a group, research analysts anticipate that Tower Semiconductor Ltd. will post 3.57 EPS for the current year.

About Tower Semiconductor

Tower Semiconductor, traded on NASDAQ under the symbol TSEM, is a specialty foundry company that provides analog and mixed-signal semiconductor manufacturing services to a broad array of customers worldwide. The company focuses on delivering tailored process technologies for high-growth markets, including radio frequency (RF), power management, imaging, automotive electronics, and Internet of Things (IoT) applications. By combining deep process know-how with flexible manufacturing capabilities, Tower Semiconductor supports the development and volume production of advanced semiconductor devices for fabless and integrated device manufacturer customers.

The company’s technology portfolio spans standard and specialty processes such as CMOS, BiCMOS, high-voltage, radio frequency, silicon photonics, micro-electromechanical systems (MEMS) and image sensor production.