Chevy Chase Trust Holdings Inc. bought a new position in shares of Blackstone Group LP (NYSE:BX) in the third quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The institutional investor bought 11,505 shares of the asset manager’s stock, valued at approximately $562,000.
A number of other institutional investors and hedge funds also recently bought and sold shares of the stock. State Street Corp bought a new stake in shares of Blackstone Group in the 3rd quarter worth about $45,295,000. Financial Architects Inc bought a new stake in shares of Blackstone Group in the 3rd quarter valued at approximately $488,000. Cetera Advisor Networks LLC boosted its holdings in shares of Blackstone Group by 1.6% in the 3rd quarter. Cetera Advisor Networks LLC now owns 42,477 shares of the asset manager’s stock worth $2,072,000 after purchasing an additional 670 shares during the period. Torray LLC increased its position in shares of Blackstone Group by 23.0% during the 3rd quarter. Torray LLC now owns 62,228 shares of the asset manager’s stock valued at $3,039,000 after purchasing an additional 11,647 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Balasa Dinverno & Foltz LLC purchased a new stake in Blackstone Group during the 3rd quarter valued at $231,000. 53.38% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.
Several brokerages have recently weighed in on BX. Bank of America downgraded shares of Blackstone Group from a “buy” rating to a “neutral” rating and reduced their target price for the company from $54.00 to $52.00 in a research note on Monday, October 14th. Wells Fargo & Co raised their price objective on shares of Blackstone Group from $60.00 to $64.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Thursday, December 19th. S&P Equity Research downgraded Blackstone Group from an “outperform” rating to a “market perform” rating in a report on Tuesday, September 24th. Oppenheimer cut shares of Blackstone Group from an “outperform” rating to a “market perform” rating in a report on Tuesday, September 24th. They noted that the move was a valuation call. Finally, Deutsche Bank boosted their price objective on shares of Blackstone Group from $50.00 to $55.00 and gave the company a “hold” rating in a research report on Thursday, December 19th. Nine equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and three have issued a buy rating to the company’s stock. The company presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $55.13.
In other Blackstone Group news, major shareholder Holdings L.P. Blackstone III sold 6,864,545 shares of Blackstone Group stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, November 4th. The shares were sold at an average price of $35.54, for a total transaction of $243,965,929.30. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. Also, major shareholder Blackstone Group Inc sold 8,875,211 shares of the stock in a transaction on Tuesday, December 3rd. The stock was sold at an average price of $2.50, for a total transaction of $22,188,027.50. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last 90 days, insiders have sold 16,608,103 shares of company stock worth $311,151,291. 1.00% of the stock is owned by company insiders.
Shares of BX traded up $0.11 during trading hours on Wednesday, hitting $55.40. The company had a trading volume of 1,238,129 shares, compared to its average volume of 4,773,226. Blackstone Group LP has a one year low of $28.51 and a one year high of $56.17. The company has a market capitalization of $36.53 billion, a PE ratio of 24.51, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.45 and a beta of 1.44. The company has a current ratio of 1.05, a quick ratio of 1.05 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.82. The company’s fifty day moving average price is $53.38 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $49.42.
Blackstone Group (NYSE:BX) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, October 23rd. The asset manager reported $0.58 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.53 by $0.05. The firm had revenue of $1.74 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.31 billion. Blackstone Group had a net margin of 27.05% and a return on equity of 7.61%. Blackstone Group’s revenue was down 9.9% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the previous year, the business posted $0.63 EPS. Analysts forecast that Blackstone Group LP will post 2.28 earnings per share for the current year.
Blackstone Group Profile
The Blackstone Group L.P. is a publicly owned alternative asset manager. The firm also provides capital markets services to its clients. It provides its services to public and corporate pension funds, academic, cultural, and charitable organizations, retirees, sovereign wealth funds, and institutional and individual investors.
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