Welch & Forbes LLC Lowers Stock Holdings in Ball Corporation $BALL

Welch & Forbes LLC lessened its stake in Ball Corporation (NYSE:BALL) by 13.7% during the 1st quarter, according to its most recent 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The firm owned 67,392 shares of the company’s stock after selling 10,698 shares during the period. Welch & Forbes LLC’s holdings in Ball were worth $3,984,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Several other institutional investors and hedge funds have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in BALL. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD grew its stake in shares of Ball by 5.6% in the 4th quarter. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD now owns 18,886,681 shares of the company’s stock valued at $1,000,429,000 after purchasing an additional 999,690 shares during the last quarter. T. Rowe Price Investment Management Inc. raised its stake in shares of Ball by 3.8% during the fourth quarter. T. Rowe Price Investment Management Inc. now owns 7,225,631 shares of the company’s stock worth $382,742,000 after purchasing an additional 266,238 shares during the last quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP raised its stake in shares of Ball by 47.8% during the fourth quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP now owns 5,658,732 shares of the company’s stock worth $299,749,000 after purchasing an additional 1,830,434 shares during the last quarter. Boston Partners lifted its holdings in shares of Ball by 24.2% during the fourth quarter. Boston Partners now owns 4,739,044 shares of the company’s stock worth $251,057,000 after purchasing an additional 922,747 shares during the period. Finally, Invesco Ltd. lifted its holdings in shares of Ball by 14.9% during the third quarter. Invesco Ltd. now owns 4,651,348 shares of the company’s stock worth $234,521,000 after purchasing an additional 602,137 shares during the period. 86.51% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

BALL has been the topic of several recent research reports. Truist Financial boosted their price objective on shares of Ball from $75.00 to $77.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Wednesday, April 15th. Citigroup reduced their target price on shares of Ball from $73.00 to $72.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research note on Thursday. Weiss Ratings raised shares of Ball from a “hold (c)” rating to a “hold (c+)” rating in a report on Tuesday, June 30th. UBS Group dropped their price target on shares of Ball from $66.00 to $64.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a research note on Wednesday, May 6th. Finally, Royal Bank Of Canada increased their price target on shares of Ball from $75.00 to $77.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a report on Thursday. Ten research analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and three have assigned a Hold rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $69.92.

Ball Trading Up 0.1%

NYSE:BALL opened at $61.74 on Monday. Ball Corporation has a 1 year low of $44.83 and a 1 year high of $68.29. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.25, a quick ratio of 0.72 and a current ratio of 1.12. The stock has a fifty day moving average price of $57.86 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $59.50. The stock has a market capitalization of $16.44 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 17.85, a PEG ratio of 1.20 and a beta of 0.98.

Ball (NYSE:BALL) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, May 5th. The company reported $0.94 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.85 by $0.09. The business had revenue of $3.60 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $3.34 billion. Ball had a net margin of 6.86% and a return on equity of 18.69%. The business’s revenue for the quarter was up 16.3% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the prior year, the company posted $0.76 EPS. Ball has set its FY 2026 guidance at 3.930- EPS. As a group, sell-side analysts anticipate that Ball Corporation will post 3.99 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Ball Dividend Announcement

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, June 15th. Shareholders of record on Monday, June 1st were given a dividend of $0.20 per share. This represents a $0.80 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.3%. The ex-dividend date was Monday, June 1st. Ball’s dividend payout ratio is presently 23.12%.

Ball Profile

Ball Corporation is a leading provider of sustainable aluminum packaging solutions and advanced aerospace technologies. Headquartered in Broomfield, Colorado, the company serves customers in the beverage, food and aerosol markets through a global network of manufacturing facilities. With an emphasis on sustainability and innovation, Ball designs and produces metal cans, bottles and ends that support recycling and reduce environmental impact.

The company’s packaging segment specializes in beverage cans for soft drinks, beer and energy drinks, as well as metal packaging for food and personal care applications.