Treasurer of the State of North Carolina Purchases 556,542 Shares of Lam Research Co. (NASDAQ:LRCX)

Treasurer of the State of North Carolina boosted its holdings in shares of Lam Research Co. (NASDAQ:LRCX) by 894.5% during the 4th quarter, HoldingsChannel.com reports. The institutional investor owned 618,759 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock after acquiring an additional 556,542 shares during the quarter. Treasurer of the State of North Carolina’s holdings in Lam Research were worth $44,693,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Other hedge funds have also recently made changes to their positions in the company. Vanguard Group Inc. lifted its position in shares of Lam Research by 892.7% during the fourth quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 120,787,727 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock valued at $8,724,498,000 after buying an additional 108,619,564 shares during the last quarter. FMR LLC increased its holdings in shares of Lam Research by 1,032.6% during the 4th quarter. FMR LLC now owns 40,031,194 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock valued at $2,891,453,000 after purchasing an additional 36,496,689 shares in the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC raised its position in Lam Research by 907.1% during the fourth quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 31,428,010 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock worth $2,265,610,000 after acquiring an additional 28,307,499 shares during the period. Norges Bank acquired a new stake in shares of Lam Research in the fourth quarter worth approximately $1,661,672,000. Finally, Fisher Asset Management LLC lifted its stake in Lam Research by 892.7% in the 4th quarter. Fisher Asset Management LLC now owns 18,578,181 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock worth $1,341,902,000 after purchasing an additional 16,706,708 shares in the last quarter. 84.61% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of equities analysts have recently weighed in on the company. Oppenheimer started coverage on Lam Research in a report on Thursday, March 20th. They set an “outperform” rating and a $95.00 price target for the company. Sanford C. Bernstein raised Lam Research from a “market perform” rating to an “outperform” rating and lifted their price objective for the company from $85.00 to $91.00 in a research note on Thursday, January 30th. Mizuho raised their target price on Lam Research from $87.00 to $100.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a report on Thursday, February 20th. KeyCorp raised shares of Lam Research from a “sector weight” rating to an “overweight” rating and set a $95.00 price target on the stock in a research report on Friday, January 17th. Finally, The Goldman Sachs Group dropped their price objective on shares of Lam Research from $96.00 to $85.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a report on Friday, January 10th. Six analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and eighteen have given a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat, Lam Research presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $97.59.

Insider Activity

In related news, SVP Seshasayee Varadarajan sold 110,080 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, February 20th. The stock was sold at an average price of $90.00, for a total transaction of $9,907,200.00. Following the transaction, the senior vice president now directly owns 179,084 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $16,117,560. The trade was a 38.07 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is accessible through the SEC website. Company insiders own 0.29% of the company’s stock.

Lam Research Trading Up 18.0 %

NASDAQ LRCX opened at $71.11 on Thursday. The firm has a 50-day moving average price of $77.02 and a 200 day moving average price of $76.65. Lam Research Co. has a 52-week low of $56.32 and a 52-week high of $113.00. The stock has a market capitalization of $91.28 billion, a P/E ratio of 21.60, a P/E/G ratio of 1.47 and a beta of 1.52. The company has a quick ratio of 1.73, a current ratio of 2.54 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.51.

Lam Research (NASDAQ:LRCX) last posted its earnings results on Wednesday, January 29th. The semiconductor company reported $0.91 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.87 by $0.04. Lam Research had a return on equity of 51.86% and a net margin of 26.49%. Equities research analysts expect that Lam Research Co. will post 3.71 EPS for the current year.

Lam Research Announces Dividend

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, April 9th. Investors of record on Wednesday, March 5th were given a dividend of $0.23 per share. This represents a $0.92 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.29%. The ex-dividend date was Wednesday, March 5th. Lam Research’s dividend payout ratio is presently 27.96%.

About Lam Research

Lam Research Corporation designs, manufactures, markets, refurbishes, and services semiconductor processing equipment used in the fabrication of integrated circuits. The company offers ALTUS systems to deposit conformal films for tungsten metallization applications; SABRE electrochemical deposition products for copper interconnect transition that offers copper damascene manufacturing; SOLA ultraviolet thermal processing products for film treatments; and VECTOR plasma-enhanced CVD ALD products.