Wedbush Securities Inc. Purchases 1,066 Shares of W. R. Berkley Co. (NYSE:WRB)

Wedbush Securities Inc. increased its position in shares of W. R. Berkley Co. (NYSE:WRB) by 6.7% during the fourth quarter, HoldingsChannel reports. The fund owned 16,875 shares of the insurance provider’s stock after buying an additional 1,066 shares during the quarter. Wedbush Securities Inc.’s holdings in W. R. Berkley were worth $988,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Other institutional investors and hedge funds have also bought and sold shares of the company. State Street Corp grew its holdings in shares of W. R. Berkley by 48.6% during the third quarter. State Street Corp now owns 15,121,001 shares of the insurance provider’s stock worth $857,814,000 after purchasing an additional 4,947,830 shares during the last quarter. Norges Bank bought a new stake in W. R. Berkley during the 4th quarter worth approximately $272,582,000. JPMorgan Chase & Co. grew its holdings in W. R. Berkley by 55.1% during the 3rd quarter. JPMorgan Chase & Co. now owns 7,366,424 shares of the insurance provider’s stock worth $417,897,000 after acquiring an additional 2,616,227 shares during the last quarter. Principal Financial Group Inc. raised its stake in shares of W. R. Berkley by 211.3% during the third quarter. Principal Financial Group Inc. now owns 3,674,171 shares of the insurance provider’s stock valued at $208,436,000 after acquiring an additional 2,493,758 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Geode Capital Management LLC raised its stake in shares of W. R. Berkley by 47.9% during the third quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 7,591,353 shares of the insurance provider’s stock valued at $429,266,000 after acquiring an additional 2,459,073 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 68.82% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of research firms recently weighed in on WRB. Truist Financial increased their price objective on W. R. Berkley from $68.00 to $80.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Thursday. Wells Fargo & Company increased their price target on W. R. Berkley from $67.00 to $70.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research note on Tuesday, January 28th. Bank of America reaffirmed a “neutral” rating and issued a $74.00 price objective (up from $73.00) on shares of W. R. Berkley in a research note on Tuesday, April 1st. Royal Bank of Canada reissued a “sector perform” rating and set a $63.00 target price on shares of W. R. Berkley in a research report on Tuesday, January 28th. Finally, StockNews.com downgraded shares of W. R. Berkley from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Thursday. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, eight have assigned a hold rating and five have assigned a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, W. R. Berkley presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $65.13.

W. R. Berkley Trading Down 6.8 %

WRB opened at $65.53 on Monday. The company has a market cap of $24.85 billion, a P/E ratio of 15.02, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.56 and a beta of 0.40. The company has a fifty day moving average price of $62.79 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $60.58. The company has a current ratio of 0.36, a quick ratio of 0.36 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.34. W. R. Berkley Co. has a 1-year low of $50.73 and a 1-year high of $76.38.

W. R. Berkley (NYSE:WRB) last issued its earnings results on Monday, January 27th. The insurance provider reported $1.13 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.95 by $0.18. W. R. Berkley had a return on equity of 20.83% and a net margin of 12.88%. Analysts predict that W. R. Berkley Co. will post 4.33 EPS for the current fiscal year.

W. R. Berkley Announces Dividend

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, March 12th. Stockholders of record on Monday, March 3rd were issued a dividend of $0.08 per share. This represents a $0.32 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.49%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Monday, March 3rd. W. R. Berkley’s dividend payout ratio is currently 7.34%.

W. R. Berkley Profile

W. R. Berkley Corporation, an insurance holding company, operates as a commercial lines writers worldwide. It operates in two segments, Insurance and Reinsurance & Monoline Excess. The Insurance segment underwrites commercial insurance business, including excess and surplus lines, admitted lines, and specialty personal lines.